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THE WAGES OF SIN 


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Xovetrs IFnternationat Scries, 1 Ro. 102. 


THE WAGES OF SIN 


BY 

LUCAS MALET 

AUTHOR OF 

“COL. F.NDERBY’S WIFE,” “MRS. LORIMER,” ETC., ETC. 


( -te^ } 1<2S-Z_ 


nAuthori^ed Edition 



NEW YORK 


UNITED STATES BOOK COMPANY 


SUCCESSORS TO 

JOHN W. LOVELL COMPANY 

150 WORTH ST., COR. MISSION PtACE 

A n 




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Copyright, 1890, 

BY 

UNITED STATES BOOK COMPANY. 


CONTENTS 


Book 1. — Man and Maid. 

Chapter I. 

„ II. - - 

„ III. - - 

„ IV. - - 

V. - - 


Book II. — Miss Mary Crookenden. 


Chapter I. 

II. 

III. 

IV. 
V. 

VI. 


Book III.— St. Miciiel-les-Bains. 


Chapter I. 
„ II. 
„ in. 
w. 


Book IV. — The Drag on the Wheel. 


Chapter I. 
tt II. 

„ HI. 

„ IV. 
„ V. 

„ VI. 
„ VII. 
.. VIII. 


PAGE 

I 

IQ 

44 

54 


65 

69 

78 

87 

95 

105 


122 

129 

138 

153 


163 

173 

190 

208 

217 

229 

239 

246 


IV 


Contents. 


Book V. — Two Idylls. 


Chapter I. 

II. 

III. 

IV. 
V. 

VI. 
VII. 


Book VI. — Satan as an Angel of Light. 
Chapter I. 

„ II. 

„ HI. 

„ iv. 

„ V. 

..VI. 


Book VII. — The Wages are Paid. 


Chapter I. 
„ II. 
„ III. 
.. IV. 
V. 

.. VI. 
Epilogue • 


PAGE 

260 

276 

284 

29S 

305 

316 

332 


344 

350 

365 

37i 

381 

386 


393 

398 

410 

415 

426 

440 

444 


THE WAGES OF SIN. 


BOOK I.— MAN AND MAID. 

Things are what they are, and the consequences of them will be what 
they will be ; why then should we desire to be deceived.’ — Bishop Butler. 

Chapter I. 

One September day towards sunset, when the world was 
younger by some fourteen or fifteen years than it is now, 
a small family party was gathered together in the long, 
narrow strip of turf and flower-garden known as the bowl- 
ing-green, that lies under the old wing of Slerracombe 
House. 

The individuals composing this party were not, with 
one exception, very remarkable at first sight. A lady of 
about five-and-forty, seated in a low wicker chair, near a 
tea table placed on the gravel just outside the open doors 
of the conservatory. She was large, sleek, rather heavy- 
featured. Arrayed in wig and robes, she would have made an 
impressive judge. Her presence would have added dignity, 
as well as material weight, to the bench. She was not, 
however, arrayed in official robes, but merely in mourn- 
ing — mourning, it may be added, of the order which, 
among sober-minded persons of the upper classes, denotes 
widowhood in the passive and permanent rather than the 
active stage. At the table, two little girls — in brown hol- 
land frocks and straw hats of the kind known to contem- 
porary fashion as 1 limpet-shaped/ and fondly believed to 
compensate by successful preservation of the complexion 
of the wearer, for the immediate disadvantage of extreme 
unbecomingness — were sitting silent, absorbed in the as- 
similation of liberal supplies of cake and grapes, and 
bread and jam. Further, a handsome, black-headed boy, 
also consuming cake, but taking his meal in an ambulatory 
and episodic manner, in the intervals of driving away a 
tame doe, with a bell round her neck, whose feminine in- 

B 


2 


The Wages of Sin. 


quisitiveness prompted her to ill-judged inquiries regard- 
ing the contents of teacups and sugar basins. Finally, 
a clergyman, Kent Crookenden by name, Rector of Brattle- 
worthy with ‘"lerracombe, a bachelor of about fifty, brother- 
in-law of the lady in the wicker chair, and guardian of 
her only son, Lancelot — the boy already mentioned. 

The Rector had refused to have any tea. He leaned 
back in another wicker chair, his legs crossed, his coat 
thrown open, and his thumbs stuck in the armholes of his 
waistcoat, surveying the scene before him with an expres- 
sion of half-contemptuous though not unkindly amusement. 
Sometimes his eyes wandered from the group in the fore- 
ground to a wide stretch of open park, dotted with fallow 
deer, lying north and west below the terraced garden. 
The park dipped to the left towards a wooded stream in 
the hollow, and swept up again into breezy hillside, red 
and yellow with withering bracken. Beyond it the sea, 
crossed by wandering tide-lines of the palest azure, spread 
away calm and oily, under a sky of filmy white cloud, to 
the high faint line of the horizon. 

The view was extremely pleasing in its dreamy quiet, 
specially to one with a taste for the characteristic features 
of West Country scenery. And Kent Crookenden was 
sincerely attached to the West Country. All the same 
he was not of the temper of mind that finds its highest 
and most constant satisfaction in the contemplation of the 
outward aspects of nature. Hill, wood, stream, moorland, 
sea, values of light and shade, splendours of colour are, no 
doubt, immensely elevating objects of attention in their 
way ; but they do not, as a rule, minister largely or directly 
to the spectator’s sense of humour. And Kent Crooken- 
den’s sense of humour was almost undesirably keen and 
persistent. To this, his face — it had no hair on it — bore 
ample testimony. A square forehead. Bright, steady eyes, 
set rather far apart. A hooked nose, with a noticeable 
downward inclination of the tip, the nostrils deep cut and 
open. A mouth thin-lipped and under hung ; the corners 
of it also with a downward inclination, and with queer 
twitchings and puckerings about them suggestive of 
thoughts a trifle too merry or too caustic for ordinary 
conversation. 


Man and Maid . 


3 


After some years of travels both in the East and the 
United States, at about thirty, Kent Crookenden had sud- 
denly decided to enter the Church. In one respect the 
decision was, certainly, a wise one. Fora strong sense of 
humour necessarily demands a good supply of raw material, 
in the form of human nature, upon which to exercise itself ; 
and whatever the more serious privileges of the clerical 
profession may be, there is no question but that it offers 
to any man, with the wit to use them, singular facilities 
for intimate and varied study of the ways and habits, the 
weaknesses, the appetites, the endless touching little stu- 
pidities in thought and conduct of that most inimitable 
invention, the human animal. 

In due time his elder brother, Zachary Crookenden, had 
presented him to the living of Brattleworthy with Sierra- 
combe. For that gentleman had bought the advowson of 
the living when, his fortune having reached very consider- 
able proportions, he married Miss Caroline Hellard — 
niece of the late and cousin of the present Lord Comb- 
martin — retired from active participation in the affairs of 
the well-known firm of Crookenden, Manserge and Co., 
merchants, shipping agents, and bankers, of Bristol and 
New York ; and, having purchased Slerracombe House 
and some three or four thousand acres of land adjoining, 
settled himself down to live the leisurely life of an English 
country gentleman. 

Kent Crookenden had ceased to entertain any dreams 
of ecstatic personal bliss by the time he took up his resi- 
dence in the ugly, white-washed rectory house at Brattle- 
worthy. And he was consequently very well satisfied with 
his surroundings. He amused himself greatly by observ- 
ing the manners and customs of his merchant brother 
turned squire, of the local gentry, of his fellow-clergy, and 
of his parishioners. And being a member of the Anthro- 
pological Society, and a fair ethnologist and archaeologist, 
he brought a considerable amount of theoretical knowledge 
to bear upon the facts immediately presented to his notice. 
He had, indeed, a propos of certain quaint wedding customs 
obtaining in the neighbouring fishing village of Beera 
Mills, written a monograph on Primitive Marriage, which 
— whatever its scientific value — certainly afforded very 

b 2 


4 


The Wages of Sin. 


gay reading to persons whose mental digestion was not 
fatally weakened by over refinement. 

Upon the still September afternoon in question, the 
human creature who had the honour of occupying a fore- 
most place in the Rector’s attention, was the, as yet, 
unspecified member of the family party, viz., a slender 
slip of a girl, whose light movements and rather startling 
costume rendered her small presence of marked value in 
the otherwise low-toned picture. 

She wore a straight, sacque-shaped frock of orange and 
scarlet checked cotton, and a broad scarlet sash knotted 
loosely about her waist. The frock was undeniably short, 
and revealed the embroidered edge of a white petticoat 
and a length of open- worked, black silk stocking. Her 
hat bore no relation to the estimable limpet. It was white, 
high-crowned, and adorned on one side with a flaring 
bow of scarlet ribbon. Yet the little lady’s complexion 
did not appear to have suffered to the extent to which, 
according to all nursery canons of poetical justice, it 
ought to have suffered from this reprehensible levity of 
headgear. Her small face was very pale. 

Indeed, there were curiously contradictory elements in 
the little girl’s appearance. At a short distance the effect 
of her vivid figure was like that of some coquettish per- 
sonage on the lid of a Parisian bonboniere. Yet the child’s 
face was not only pale, but full of reserve, of a question- 
ing wistfulness, lighted by a pair of big, wondering, dark- 
blue eyes. And it was precisely this contradiction, this 
duality of suggestion, that her uncle, Kent Crookenden, 
found so interesting as he sat watching her. Mary was 
twelve years old. Usually an awkward age, as the Rector 
reflected. It was difficult to say as yet — for she was like 
a half-fledged bird, all eyes and neck and legs — whether 
she would grow up commonplace-looking, or develop into 
an unusually beautiful woman, like 

Mr. Crookenden did not finish the sentence even in 
thought. He agreed with himself to change the subject 
immediately. It was a subject, in fact, which for many 
years he had found a very frequent necessity for changing. 
But, though his efforts would at first appear successful, 
he observed that his mental conversation had a tiresome 


Man and Maid, 


5 


habit of working back into the same groove again before 
many days, or indeed hours, were over. 

On the present occasion he routed the unprofitable sub- 
ject completely, as he fondly imagined, by turning and ad- 
dressing his sister-in-law. 

1 By the way, Caroline/ he remarked, * if Coad says 
anything to you about a party of young people from Beera 
picnicing down at Red Rock, remember I gave them 
leave to go there. They asked permission very civilly, 
and I saw no objection to granting it/ 

‘Yes, I suppose it wouldn't do to refuse people now. 
If you have finished your tea, Adela, you and Carrie 
may go ' — this over her ample shoulder to the silent little 
girls in brown holland. ‘ Of course I never pretended to 
care about the park being thrown open; but poor Mr. 
Crookenden made a point of it/ 

‘ Quite right too/ said the Rector. 

‘And I suppose these people are not likely to do any 
serious damage.' 

‘ Damage ? What possible damage can they or any 
one else do to a mile of rabbit warren, two or three acres 
of perpendicular slate and granite, and the Atlantic ? ’ 

‘ Oh, well/ Mrs. Crookenden rejoined, in her calm, 
well-bred way, ‘ they leave bottles about, and paper-bags, 
which is not at all nice. And then the children are very 
fond of taking their tea down to Red Rock, and I am 
always rather afraid of infection. With people out of 
those stuffy little cottages at Beera, one never can be 
quite sure, you know. Have you said your grace, 
Carrie ? ’ 

This again over her shoulder, with a slow smile at the 
two girls as they left the table. Then she settled herself 
back in her chair and applied her fingers to the further 
development of a nebulous garment in crochet. 

The Rector made no reply to his sister-in-law's obser- 
vations, but his mouth twitched slightly and turned down 
at one corner. 

He held that there was a very healthy reserve force of 
egotism in Mrs. Crookenden. Her egotism was not of the 
baser sort, he admitted. It was a comprehensive, tribal 
kind of egotism, including several persons besides her. 


6 


The Wages of Sin. 


self. Whether it had ever entirely included her late 
husband, his brother Zachary, the Rector had never yet 
been able to determine. Still, in the main, he liked his 
sister-in-law. She was a distinguished-looking woman ; 
and, save when you trod on the toes of some small 
prejudice, a very fairly agreeable one. She was also very 
fairly amenable to reason, which, considering the relation 
in which he stood both to her son and the Slerracombe 
property, was a matter of sincere thanksgiving to the 
Rector. Moreover, she kept a first-rate cook. I regret 
to admit this item carried considerable weight in Kent 
Crookenden’s mind. 

In the world at large Mrs. Crookenden had the reputa- 
tion of being a very admirable person. She was of a 
placid disposition. The whole business of her courtship 
and marriage had been pre-eminently distinguished for 
its placidity. As the younger daughter of a younger son 
— by no means oppressed with a superfluity of worldly 
goods — she, being a right-minded young lady, had im- 
mediately realised the desirability of an alliance with the 
rich, middle-aged merchant-banker. She accepted him 
calmly, and without hesitation, when he proposed to her. 
He had been married before. But his first wife— I speak 
from the point of view of the poor lady’s successor — had 
had the good taste to die childless. The second Mrs. 
Crookenden proceeded to fulfil all her marital obligations, 
the production of a son and heir included, with well-bred 
composure. And when Mr. Crookenden, after a few years’ 
residence at Slerracombe — finding, somehow, the leisurely 
life of a country gentleman far harder work than that of 
the Bristol counting-house — left this world, in which he 
had laid up such a handsome amount of material treasure, 
for that other, in which all such treasure is reported to 
be inconveniently devoid of market value, his wife mani- 
fested no objection to surviving him. 

In fact, she survived him with what appeared to some 
persons — among them William Crookenden, now head of 
the firm, and father of little Mary— an uncalled-for amount 
of her habitual placidity. The Dowager Lady Combmartin 
and the Hellard side of the connection, however, took 
a different view of her conduct. And, being who they 


Man and Maid. 


7 


were, surely their view must have been the correct one ? 
They declared that — * dearest Carrie, as usual, was be- 
having quite beautifully. And they did hope, poor darling, 
after all she had gone through, that she would be re- 
warded/ It was by way of contributing to this end, I 
suppose, that they all elected to come down in little batches 
of twos and threes and stay at Slerracombe shortly after 
the funeral. The Hellards are a numerous clan as every- 
body knows. They hold together. They have a great 
power of standing back to back. Their Irish estate pays 
very badly. They are not rich, but they are acquisitive. 
They make excellent use of their opportunities. A great 
many of them were a great deal at Slerracombe during 
that spring and summer; and the weather, I remember, 
was particularly lovely. 

Kent Crookenden derived much edification from the 
observation of these things. Old Lady Combmartin was 
most gracious to him, pronouncing him very superior to 
the rest of his family. Lady Dorothy Hellard, a sprightly 
spinster whose age it would be uncourteous to state in 
plain figures, also looked kindly upon him. Said, more 
than once, how thankful she should be if she could only 
manage to be more with dearest Carrie in future. Often 
spoke of her longing for a quiet country life. And re- 
marked casually one day that, with a little building, the 
Rectory would not really be such a very bad house. 
The Rector, however, did not see it ; which means that he 
saw quite clearly enough to see through it, and the notion 
of running in couples with Lady Dorothy failed to at- 
tract him. Possibly the unprofitable subject which he so 
constantly tried and, alas ! failed to expunge from his 
thoughts had something to do with this disinclination. 
For a man may be a good ethnologist and member of 
any number of learned societies, and yet have a weak un- 
scientific side to him, where sentiment obtains to the 
lamentable discomfiture of common-sense and pure reason. 

But Mrs. Crookenden, being ignorant of the existence 
of the unprofitable subject, and having had many con- 
fidential conversations with old Lady Combmartin, still 
entertained a hope that the Rector might not remain 
everlastingly obdurate. Now, as she sat in large, judicial 


8 


The Wages of Sin. 


silence developing her woollen crochet garment, her mind 
was busy, as it had so often been busy before, with de- 
vices for bringing round the conversation to marriage in 
general, and the Lady Dorothy’s marriage in particular. 
Unfortunately, the Rector was somewhat unapproachable 
when it came to personal matters. And how to offer her 
cousin to him as permanent lady companion, delicately, 
diplomatically, yet clearly and unmistakably, Mrs. Crooken- 
den really did not quite see. 

Meanwhile Mary, who had been flitting about at the 
further end of the long strip of turf, suddenly bore down 
upon her uncle. The girl and the tame doe arrived to- 
gether with a rush which caused Mrs. Crookenden to look 
up from her crochet with an air of cool, remonstrant 
wonder. She possessed the convenient gift of expressing 
annoyance and displeasure without resorting to the coarse 
and more or less compromising medium of speech. 

‘ Please, Uncle Kent, may I go down into the park with 
Lance ? ’ the girl asked. ‘ You needn’t go home just yet, 
need you ? Lance has been to look at the hall clock. He 
says it’s ever so early. 1 

Kent Crookenden, though not greatly addicted to 
caresses, put his arm round the slim, brilliant, little figure, 
and drew it close to him. 

‘ What do you want to go down into the park again for, 
Miss Polly ? ’ he asked. 

‘Why, to draw the deer. They’re standing nice and 
quiet now. And Lance says we can get quite near them.’ 

It was observable that Mary’s voice was singularly low 
and grave in quality, for a girl of her age. 

Kent Crookenden smiled at her, at once tenderly and 
mockingly, and gently pinched her ear. 

‘ Draw, draw, draw, from morning to night ; why, this 
devotion to the fine arts is astounding, Miss Polly. Do 
you know, Caroline,’ he went on, turning to his sister-in- 
law, ‘ this young lady promises to introduce a quite new 
element into the family history.’ 

‘ I think she has introduced it already/ Mrs. Crookenden 
remarked. 

‘Yes, perhaps she has/ the Rector said, drily. ‘New 
elements are wholesome. But I was referring specially 


Man and Maid. 


9 


to the artistic element, which has not, so far, been culti- 
vated very successfully among us Crookendens. For we 
can hardly call poor, dear Sara Jacobini, with that im- 
pecunious, operatic Hebrew husband of hers, a success, 
I suppose. By the way, have you happened to hear any- 
thing of the poor woman lately, Caroline ? ’ 

I Nothing at all/ replied Mrs. Crookenden, a positive 
richness of negative in her tone. 

( Oh ! I beg your pardon. I forgot second cousins don’t 
count on my side of the family. All the same, I own I 
have a weakness for Sara Jacobini. She has stuck by 
her operatic Hebrew very gallantly, through good report 
and evil report. I must remember to write to her again. 
I ought to have written sooner. Well, and so you want 
to go and draw the deer, Polly ; and I want to go home 
to my books and my dinner. Whose wants are the most 
imperative, do you think, yours or mine ? ’ 

The little girl nestled up against him prettily, coax- 
ingly . — * Mine, I guess/ she said. 

Mrs. Crookenden moved slightly, causing her silk 
dress to rustle and her wicker chair to creak. 

* Very well then, I suppose I must endure the pangs 
of intellectual and physical hunger and give you half-an- 
hour longer, young lady. But where is the famous draw- 
ing book ? Let me look at the labours of the day as far 
as they have gone yet.' 

4 I ’low ' began Mary, brightly. 

Mrs. Crookenden glanced up from her crochet again, 
with that same air of cool remonstrant wonder, as though 
the speaker came perilously near being guilty of contempt 
of court. 

I I ’low I’d just as soon you didn’t see it, Uncle Kent. 
You never know what my drawings are meant for ; any- 
way, you make believe you don’t. Lance always knows, 
now/ 

1 Oh ! Lancelot always knows, does he ? Lancelot is 
a monstrously clever fellow/ said the Rector, pinching 
her ear again. 

The boy was standing in front of his uncle, while the 
tame doe poked her square pinkish-brown muzzle under 
his arm in the vain effort to get at the leaves on the twig 


10 


The Wages of Sin . 


of lime he held just beyond her reach. The doe was 
strong. She pushed and pressed with her hard mus- 
cular shoulders. But the boy was stronger still. He 
stood his ground. He was not thinking about the doe 
and her desire for lime leaves, but about his little cousin, 
and her desire to go down with him into the park 
again. Lancelot entertained much respectful admiration 
for his little cousin. He liked to be with her, though she 
did snub him a good deal at times. Polly was a new ex- 
perience. He had never seen anybody like her. So he 
took the snubbing as part of the general novelty and bore 
it very good-temperedly. 

He was a fine-looking lad, with the square-made figure, 
short, straight nose, well-shaped mouth — the lips full, 
yet firm and sweet — crisp hair sitting close to the head, 
smooth, oval, unshadowed face, and air of serene content 
which often go with remarkable bodily strength. His 
check tweed jacket was adorned by a multiplicity of 
pockets, and had a flap of brown leather let in on either 
shoulder. He wore very knowing breeches and gaiters. 
Lancelot hated new clothes. These were sufficiently worn 
to afford him that most perfect form of satisfaction which 
consists in indifference. To know they are so all right 
that you need not think about them is the acme of happi- 
ness in respect of clothes. Across his back he carried a 
pretty little rifle, slung by a strap. 

Kent Crookenden looked from the pale-faced girl lean- 
ing against him to this very sportsmanlike young gentle- 
man, and back again. His heavy under-jaw protruded, 
and his mouth worked into a twitching, caustic smile. Yet 
his eyes remained wholly kindly. 

1 Lancelot seems to be making all the running just now, 
eh, Polly ? * 

* He’s going back to school the day after to-morrow,’ 
she put in, apologetically. 

The Rector’s smile broadened. 

' Oh ! I’m not jealous, you conceited little puss. There, 
go along and draw the deer, or anything else you like in 
heaven or earth. Take care of her, Lancelot.’ 

'All right,’ the boy said-. He stuffed the lime leaves, 
twig and all, in between the doe’s nibbling lips. * Come 


Man and Maid . 


II 


along, Polly. Pm awfully glad you may stay. We’ll go 
anywhere you like.’ 

Then, as the boy and girl went away, side by side, 
across the terrace garden, the doe, with her tinkling bell, 
trotting mincingly in front, the Rector rose from his 
chair and walked slowly to the far end of the bowling- 
green. 

Several little matters had combined to displease Mrs. 
Crookenden. The black enamel lockets, set with dia- 
monds, depending from her gold bracelets, rattled 
ominously as she slipped the ivory crochet needle in and 
out of the white wool. Only the interests of poor Lady 
Dorothy had kept her silent. With the exception of Kent 
Mrs. Crookenden increasingly failed to see the point of her 
late husband’s family. Kent had been passed, so to 
speak, by the Hellards. That made a great difference. 
But now Kent himself elected to be annoying ; for, on 
coming back, his first observation was — 

{ Those two young things make rather a pretty pair ; eh, 
Caroline ? ’ 

The lockets rattled. The ivory needle went steadily in 
and out, in and out of the white wool. Mrs. Crooken^jn 
was never in a hurry. 

1 I have always strongly disapproved of first cousins 
marrying,’ she said, as though delivering sentence. 

The Rector sat down in his wicker chair again. 

‘ My dear Caroline, you positively take one’s breath 
away by your agility in jumping to conclusions. You leap 
to the ultimate possibility of a situation when the first 
word of the situation has barely been spoken.’ 

He leaned back, opened his coat, and stuck his thumbs 
in the armholes of his waistcoat again. 

* But I verily believe you women begin worrying about 
who your babies shall, and still more shall not, marry 
before the poor innocents are out of long clothes. It is 
the same with all of you. Your outlook is saturated with 
matrimony. In the present case, however, notwithstanding 
the acknowledged precocity of the rising generation, . I 
don’t think you need have much anxiety yet awhile. Still 
— since you have suggested the idea, Caroline — I may 
say that Lancelot might do worse, in my humble opinion, 


12 


The Wages of Sin . 


than set his affections on that young lady. If he does not, 
a good many others will, I fancy, in the course of the next 
ten years. I suspect she is going to grow into an uncom- 
monly pretty little person. And the Hellard and Coudert 
strains are strong enough and far enough apart effectually 
to neutralise any evil results of cousinship on the Crook- 
enden side, I should imagine.’ 

Mrs. Crookenden looked up. Her countenance presented 
an expanse of calm but solid displeasure. 

‘ Really this discussion seems to me rather premature,’ 
she said. ‘ They are mere children. And there are plenty 
of other people for Lancelot to marry besides your brother 
William’s daughter.’ 

‘ Oh 1 dear yes, the world is wide,’ rejoined the Rector, 
with his twitching smile. ‘And Lancelot promises to be 
a handsome fellow, possessed of a handsome fortune 
moreover — a magnet with double power of attraction both 
to maidens and their mothers. He will probably have 
opportunities of playing pitch and toss to a large extent 
with the female heart if he chooses to avail himself of 
them. But I fancy he won't do that. He is a steady, 
persistent, dependable kind of being ; whereas poor little 
Mary will change her mind, or not know it — which comes 
to much the same in the end — a good many times before 
she settles down. Her southern blood will always make 
it only too possible she should be out of harmony with 
her English surroundings.’ 

‘ Her dress is sufficiently out of harmony with them 
already,’ Mrs. Crookenden remarked. ‘ And her accent is 
very peculiar. I have warned Carrie and Adela about it. 
I should be very sorry if they caught it. She uses most 
extraordinary expressions, too. Really, I think your brother 
William makes a dreadful mistake in leaving her so much 
with that negro nurse.’ 

‘ Mulatress,' interrupted the Rector. 

But Mrs. Crookenden was not to be interrupted. She 
was placid, she was judicial, but she clearly had put on 
the black cap in respect of little Mary Crookenden’s up- 
bringing. 

‘ I don’t pretend to know what the degree of colour 
ma}' be,’ she continued. ‘To me she is simply a negro 


Man and Maid. 


13 


woman — a woman who has been a slave, too. It is the 
most extraordinary arrangement. After his poor wife’s 
death ■’ 

* Ah/ said the Rector, very softly. 

1 It would obviously have been very much wiser if your 
brother William had dismissed her and engaged a proper 
English maid. It would have been much better, of course, 
to let that curious American element die out altogether. 

Kent Crookenden crossed his legs, and patted one foot 
up and down reflectively on the gravel. 

1 Oh ! no doubt there is much to be said for making a 
clean sweep after a funeral/ he remarked. 1 Relics are a 
mistake. They sadly mitigate one’s appreciation of the 
blessings of the present. The philosophy of forgetfulness 
is a very profound philosophy.’ 

As he spoke he was conscious of an almost painful 
scraping of his chest, caused by the fluted gold setting of 
a certain little miniature he wore on a black ribbon round 
his neck. Artistically considered it was a very worthless 
little miniature, feebly tentatively painted and ill-drawn. 
It represented a young girl of seventeen or eighteen in a 
prim bodice of a bygone fashion. The young girl’s nose 
was uncertain, her forehead and the lower part of her 
face were in two different planes. She had little Mary 
Crookenden’s dark blue eyes and shaded fair hair. The 
Rector fancied the rim of the miniature must have caught 
against one of the buttons of his undershirt. He gave 
himself a shake to make it lie flat again. 

1 If Mary is to be an Englishwoman, then in common 
justice to her, her father should have her brought up like 
other children/ Mrs. Crookenden proceeded, in her calm, im- 
pressive way. 1 Really, to-day, now, her appearance is most 
extraordinary. I am quite sorry for her, poor child. I 
am very glad we are alone. I should really regret her 
being seen except just by ourselves, you know. It is a 
thing one hardly likes to say of a relation, my dear Kent, 
but the poor child’s appearance is positively vulgar.’ 

Mrs. Crookenden drew herself up and moved her lips 
as though she had a bad taste in her mouth. 

1 Dear me 1 ’ exclaimed the Rector. ‘ I had no idea 
Mary’s red frock was so seriously compromising. We 


14 


The Wages of Sin. 


live and learn. Perhaps Mrs. Chloe’s taste is a trifle 
barbaric. But she is a good, faithful soul, nevertheless. 
And she has taught my cook some excellent Creole dishes, 
so of course my mouth is stopped. I can't speak evil of 
her/ 

1 1 am afraid her adulation of Mary is likely to put the 
poor child in a lamentably false position.' 

1 Or start her with a wholesome stock of belief in the 
kindness of her fellow mortals/ 

Living alone had begotten a rather prosing habit in 
Mr. Crookenden, I fear. 

1 These are the two points of view, Caroline,’ he went on. 
i Nature takes care of most young things. Gives them 
nests, or holes, or burrows ; affectionate, weak-minded 
parents to cuddle up against ; warms, feeds, shelters them 
— does her best to put them in a lamentably false position, 
in short. It is a necessary economy of force, I suppose. 
For if the poor little wretches did not start with a few 
delusions regarding their individual importance and the 
amiability of their species, they would hardly have 
courage to go on living at all. Just the same takes place 
in the case of the small human animal. Nature provides 
it with a silly, doting mother to stand between it and 
awkward realities, and bolster up its poor little pluck with 
comfortable lies ’ 

He broke off abruptly, and gazed at some sea-gulls 
floating far overhead against the pale blue sky. 

‘ Here there is no mother, you see,’ he added, presently. 
1 And so perhaps the old slave-woman, who has a tender 
heart notwithstanding her loud taste in dress, may be 
better than nothing as a shelter to that sensitive little 
girl/ 

Persons blessed with Mrs. Crookenden’s description of 
temperament are not easily convicted of sin. Reproof 
usually presents itself to them rather as the result of an 
impertinence on the part of somebody else, than as the 
result of misdoing on their own. Conscience, indeed, 
in them is magnificently altruistic — active merely in re- 
spect of others. In respect of their own conduct it is 
finely tranquil. Yet I must do Mrs. Crookenden the 
justice to state, that on the present occasion she really had 


Man and Maid. 


5 


a vague sense of standing reproved. It occurred to her 
that perhaps she had gone dangerously far, that she had 
occupied too advanced a position. She prepared to retire 
from it. But she retired sideways, crab-fashion, and with 
no violent haste. 

1 1 think we may really leave the subject of little Mary 
now/ she said, graciously, but in tones of slight supe- 
riority. 1 1 daresay in time she may lose that unfortunate 
pronunciation. Possibly, as you say, she may grow up 
pretty. Some people admired her mother very much, I 
remember/ 

The Rector stooped down and picked up a handful of 
small pebbles off the walk at his feet. 

* I never admired her much myself. But then I cannot 
pretend to care for what is called American beauty.’ 

‘ There are Americans and Americans/ put in Kent 
Crookenden, parenthetically. 

His sister-in-law’s expression became increasingly 
gracious. She had removed the black cap. Turned 
counsel, all of a sudden, instead of judge. 

1 That is what dear Dorothy Hellard always assures 
me/ she said. * By-the-bye, it is curious that our talk 
should light on just this subject, because in a letter I had 
from her yesterday from Aldham Revel, she tells me 
there are some really charming Americans staying in the 
house. Dear Lady Aldham is quite in love with them. 
And that reminds me, Kent, didn't you tell me you were 
going to Midlandshire for some partridge shooting this 
month ? * 

The Rector was engaged in the intellectual pastime of 
throwing the pebbles, with extreme nicety of aim, one 
after the other, at a patch of grey lichen on the con- 
servatory steps. Tap, tap, went the pebbles at regular 
intervals. He did not answer his sister-in-law till he had 
disposed of the last of them. Then he said, with a certain 
deliberation — 

i Yes, I may go for a couple of Sundays, at the end 
of the month, if Ebsworthy can come over from Yeomouth 
and take the duty. I shall take Mary home to her father 
in Bristol, stay a week or ten days with him, and then go 
on to the Aldhams’ probnbly/ 


i6 


The Wages of Sin. 


Mrs. Crookenden went through a rapid calculation. 

1 Dear me ! ' she exclaimed, ‘ how exceedingly provoking ! 
You will just miss Dorothy. She leaves on the thirteenth.' 

The Rector glanced up, while his mouth twitched into a 
not altogether encouraging smile. 

* Well, Lady Dorothy will not be intolerably disappointed 
at that fact, 1 imagine. She will survive.’ — Mentally he 
added, 1 And so shall I.' 

‘She will be disappointed, very much disappointed,’ 
asserted Mrs. Crookenden, quite warmly; ‘and so will 
my aunt. You really must go sooner, Kent. Or let the 
negro woman take Mary home. You could go to Bristol 
just as well coming back.' 

Mrs. Crookenden dropped her crochet into her large 
lap and leaned forward, looking at her brother-in-law 
with a singular mixture of command and amiable invi- 
tation. 

‘You are tiresome, Kent. You never will understand 
how glad people are to meet you.’ 

‘ Lady Dorothy and Lady Combmartin are remarkably 
kind. You are remarkably kind, too, Caroline,’ he said; 
and he possessed himself of another handful of pebbles. 

Mrs. Crookenden was not given to purposeless little 
movements and fiddlings ; yet now she turned the enamel 
and diamond lockets about almost nervously. 

‘It is not easy to speak openly to you about certain 
matters, Kent,’ she began. ‘ Still I feel I ought to put — 

to put Surely you see ? Surely you cannot be blind 

to the fact that my aunt has a great regard for you, and 
that Dorothy — I am very greatly attached to dear Dorothy, 
you know, and ’ 

But the Rector held up his hand, pebbles and all. 

‘ Pardon me, Caroline,’ he said, very courteously. ‘ You 
place me in an awkward position. I can’t let you say 
something we shall both regret; and yet in stopping you 
I run the risk of appearing a conceited ass with a mightily 
good opinion of the estimation in which some persons 
hold him. Frankly I am not — and it is almost certain 
that I never shall be — in a position to marry.’ 

Mrs. Crookenden’s imagination did not, as a rule, travel 
rapidly. But on the present occasion it bestirred itself. 


Man and Maid. 


17 


It took a most remarkable little journey. It suggested 
the most surprising ideas. 

‘Why not ? 1 she demanded, with really appalling 
gravity. 

If there had been a spice of malice in the Rector's way 
of making his announcement, that malice was fully grati- 
fied. He was greatly diverted at his sister-in-law’s 
manner. 

‘ For the most practical and conclusive of reasons. I 
have nothing to settle upon a wife/ 

Mrs. Crookenden was so confused by the late excursion 
of her imagination, that she really could not speak. 

‘ All that I have — I tell you this in confidence, Caroline 
— will go to my niece, Mary. I am going to cut off all 
superfluities. I intend to save for her.’ 

* But her father ? ’ 

* Her father won’t have very much to leave her, I’m 
afraid. When he married he was a rich man ; but the end 
of the American war left him with the world to begin over 
again, as far as his private fortune was concerned. All 
his money went down in the Alabama , or into the stomachs 
of Stonewall Jackson’s soldiers.' 

The Rector began throwing the pebbles one by one at 
the patch of lichen on the steps again. 

1 All this is most extraordinary,' said Mrs. Crookenden. 
Her crochet needle recommenced operations upon the 
white wool in a manner indicative of intense disapproval. 

1 Barring maternal affection, conjugal affection has, per- 
haps, the most perverting influence on the judgment,' the 
Rector said. * William cared for his wife. His wife cared 
for the wide-verandahed Coudert Mansion down in 
Alabama, and for her father, and her brothers, and cousins. 
It is a heavy trial for any one, specially for a woman, to 
see the social order in which she was born and bred — 
whatever its inherent vices may be — crumbling into ruin 
under her feet and the feet of those she loves.’ 

The Rector paused. He had spoken with a strength of 
feeling by no means common to him. His sister-in-law 
never remembered to have seen him so much moved 
before. She was, however, one of those persons who are 
chilled rather than kindled by the emotions of others. 

c 


i8 


The Wages of Sin. 


* I can only repeat that I am very much surprised/ 
she remarked. * And that your brother William’s conduct 
appears to me most eccentric.’ 

1 It was unsuccessful in any case, as the event proved. 
The Coudert Mansion is a court of owls and bats by now, 

I suppose. The Coudert family is pretty well extinct. 
The Alabama business cost the nation I forget how many 
million sterling. And William’s wife — oh ! well, you 
remember all about that.' 

The Rector got up and stretched himself, sticking his 
thumbs into the armholes of his waistcoat again. 

1 Thus do we spend our substance for that which pro- 
fiteth nothing,’ he said. 

A footman came out through the conservatory and 
began clearing the table. Mrs. Crookenden rose, and 
moved slowly away down the bowling-green towards an 
arbour where her two brown-holland frocked little girls 
were playing with a small army of dolls. 

( I cannot admit that you are under any obligation to 
make up to Mary for her father’s recklessness,’ she said to 
the Rector, as he walked beside her. ‘ I really fail to see 
why you should sacrifice yourself. I cannot see that it is 
any concern of yours.’ 

Kent Crookenden’s heavy under jaw protruded in an 
absolutely aggressive manner. 

* Ah ! ’ he replied, ‘ all that would take too long to ex- 
plain. I have my small eccentricities, too, Caroline. 
Lancelot will have his, some day, you’ll see. They run in 
the blood.’ 

Just then the report of a gun, prolonged by a series of 
echoes, came from the breezy hillside across the valley. 

*1 hope that boy will be careful with his rifle,’ ex- 
claimed the Rector. 

* Lancelot is entirely to be trusted,’ rejoined Lancelot's 
mother, in her most superbly judicial manner. 


Man and Maid. 


19 


Chapter II. 

1 1 hate boys/ sobbed Mary Crookenden. 

She made this uncompromising statement in an ex- 
tremely unconventional attitude, lying face downwards in 
the short crisp heath, while her poor, gaudily-clad, little 
shoulders quivered convulsively. 

Lancelot knelt beside her. His smooth face was rather 
flushed, his slow, pleasant soul was greatly disquieted 
within him. The majority of his relations were not 
troubled with lively emotions; consequently his little 
cousin’s attitude both of mind and body were surprising 
to him in a high degree. He had shot a rabbit. These 
passionate tears, this alarming declaration, were the result. 
It was all really very confusing. For rabbits were there to 
be shot. That was what you had them for. And then, only 
yesterday, had he not heard his Uncle Kent tell Eliot, the 
head keeper, they really must be kept under ? They 
were becoming a perfect nuisance to the farmers. 
Lancelot would have been glad to explain this to his 
cousin. But words did not come readily to him. More- 
over, it is difficult to make explanations to the back of a 
head, to a frock, to a sash, and a pair of open-work silk 
stockings. To set to work to justify your conduct to that 
part of your hearer which happens to be uppermost, 
demands an amount of self-confidence which Lancelot 
did not possess. So he found nothing better to say than 
— * Please don’t cry so, Polly.’ 

*1 shall cry just all I want,' returned the little girl, in 
a stifled voice from out of the heath. 

This reply was hardly encouraging. The boy looked 
at her helplessly. A queer sense of shyness was upon 
him. It gave him the oddest feeling to see her fair hair 
caught and strained by the upstanding shoots of heath. 
He grew hot. He wished she would move. He wished 
somebody would come. He was vaguely alarmed at being 
there alone with her. The violence of her emotion seemed 
to put him at a great distance from her, to make them 
strangers. Lancelot was at a loss how to cover that dis- 
tance, and reopen friendly relations. But, above all, the 

c 2 


20 


The Wages of Sin. 


sight of her fair hair tangled in the heath made him horribly 
uncomfortable. 

* Polly/ he said, humbly, desperately, at last, 1 please 
would you mind doing the rest of your crying sitting up ? ’ 

1 1 won’t do anything you ask me to/ she sobbed out. 
1 You’re cruel.’ 

As the Rector had said, the boy was persistent. He 
was hurt at the rebuff ; yet he stuck to his point. 

' But there are lots of spiders about here, you know, 
and tiger-beetles and things. I don’t suppose they’d bite 
or sting you, but — well, I shouldn’t like them to crawl 
over you, Polly.’ 

To his great relief this appeal was not without effect. 
The little girl raised herself slowly, reluctantly. 

1 Are you quite sure it’s quite dead ? ’ she asked, her 
breath catching between the words. 

‘ The rabbit ? Why, of course it is — dead as a nail.’ 

Mary’s pale face was disfigured by tears. Her eyelids 
were swollen and red. She looked at him, moreover, with 
an expression of concentrated reproach and scorn, that 
was anything but complimentary. Still the boy’s spirits 
rose. He felt more secure, more every-day and com- 
fortable now he could see her face. 

* There are no end of rabbits all over the place, you 
know/ he said. ‘ There are loads of them left, you know, 
Poly/ 

‘ l hat one sat up. I saw it.’ 

1 Oh ! they can all sit up when they like, you know/ he 
rejoined, anxious to prove his victim was but as other 
rabbits are, not an abnormal, acrobatic genius among 
rodents. 

Then Lancelot suddenly grew braver. He sat down 
on the carpet of heath close beside his cousin, dragged 
out his pocket-handkerchief — fortunately it was a clean 
one — and proceeded to dab her eyes gently with it. 

1 I’m awfully sorry you minded so much/ he said. 1 If 
I'd known you’d mind I wouldn’t have shot it, Polly, 
indeed I wouldn’t. Please say you don’t hate boys, 
Polly.’ 

Now his hand undoubtedly smelt of metal, of grease 
even, from much cbntact with the gun-barrel, and Mary 


Man and Maid ’ 


21 


was a dainty little person very sensible of small disgusts, 
yet she endured his attentions resignedly. For she was 
not strong. Anger, pity, tears had fairly tired her out. 
And physical exhaustion is uncommonly demoralizing. A 
weary body refuses to respond to the call of the virtues 
militant. It informs them almost peevishly that they are 
a bore. It entirely refuses to help them to go forth to 
war and rout about. Little Mary Crookenden wished to 
continue to deplore the untimely fate of the rabbit, wished 
to keep this young murderer in well-merited disgrace; 
but she was physically unequal to the exertion. Her sense 
of the enormity of the boy's crime began to give way 
before an instinctive demand for rest and sympathy. Her 
sobs grew faint and fainter, sinking down into an occa- 
sional long-drawn sigh. Her poor little head ached. 
Unconsciously she leaned against the late disturber of her 
peace, letting her aching head rest upon the flap of 
leather let in to the shoulder of his jacket. 

Behind them the bracken and heather-clad slope swept 
upward some twenty or thirty yards to the edge of the 
cliffs that face the sea — here a clean drop of just upon 
three hundred feet to the grey beach below. Before them 
was a wide expanse of rough hilly country, intersected by 
a network of thickly wooded valleys, lying in warm misty 
shadow, save where the globular crown of an oak, or the 
ragged head of a silver fir, overtopping the surrounding 
sea of foliage, caught the sunset light. Rising from the 
valleys, little fields, absurdly cocked up on end — green 
pasture, rich, red plough land, and yellow stubble around 
the glistering corn shocks, sleeping in a glory of golden 
haze. Above, again, a long hog's-back of hill, the straight 
line of it broken here and there by a few crooked trees 
bending away as though in terror from the stormy west, 
rose, dark purple, against the suffused radiance of the 
sunset sky. 

And Lancelot Crookenden looked out over the shadowy 
woods and golden fields into that radiant sky, a sort of 
wonder in his young eyes. For the boy was making 
notable discoveries just then. They were honest, pure- 
minded discoveries, for he was blessed with the whole- 
some temperament which has a happy incapacity for 


22 


The Wages of Sin. 


making discoveries other than honest. All the same, I am 
afraid, could she have known of them, the discoveries in 
question — being made in this particular connection — would 
have met with his mother, Mrs. Crookenden’s very sincere 
disapproval. For notwithstanding his love of cricket-bats, 
and fishing-rods, and guns, his distaste for Latin primers 
and Greek grammars, and the first book of Euclid and all 
the rest of that which directs the footsteps of reluctant 
English youth along the road of scholastic and academic 
honours, this quiet-natured, sturdy schoolboy was laying 
hold of what, after all, has inspired the finest fancies of 
those classic poets whose lines he found it so abominably 
dull to copy and difficult to construe ; of what has called 
literature, and art too, pretty well into existence ; of what 
has, indeed, been the main agent in keeping life alive and 
the earth peopled ever since the day when Adam, waking 
from the strange deep sleep that fell on him in Eden, found 
Eve, new born, beside him — found woman, the secret of the 
Fall and of the Redemption, alike, lying hid as yet within 
her ; and, in finding her, found also what she is fated for 
ever to carry along with her, the mystery, the glory, the 
cruel riddle and tragedy of sex. 

Our fourteen-year-old, modern schoolboy however, let 
me hasten to add, apprehended this tremendous matter 
in its very simplest and most innocent expression. He 
was dumbly aware that a certain pleasure is derivable 
from mopping a little maiden’s wet eyes, while her head 
rests languidly on your shoulder. It is an odd sort of 
pleasure, making you shy and bold, glad and awkward, 
all at once. It induces in you a most confusing jumble 
of opposing feelings. Yet, as a whole, the result is agree- 
able, distinctly agreeable. Lancelot went so far as to hope 
Mary would make no proposal of going home just yet. 

But after a few minutes' silence the girl raised her head 
— * Listen,’ she said ; * there is some one singing.’ 

Immediately below the spot where they were sitting 
the slope is crossed by a grass path, a winding ribbon 
of green amid the darker tones of the gorse and heath. 
This path leads through a gnarled, moss-grown oak wood 
and past a couple of flat meadows lying at the bottom of 
the glen, to a dip in the wall of cliffs, known as Red 


Man and Maid. 


23 


Rock Mouth. Here the streams draining Slerracombe 
deer-park and the neighbouring valleys empty themselves, 
filtering down in a score of clear runlets through the 
purple-grey shingle into the sea. 

And it was from this path, away to the right where it 
emerged from the covert and turned the shoulder of the 
hill, that the sound of voices, which had attracted Mar/s 
attention, came. They weee charmingly fresh young 
voices, with a curiously moving lift in them as they rose 
and fell on the light evening wind, giving out the wander- 
ing discursive tune of an old Methodist hymn — 

Oh ! the pilgrims of Zion are a blessed band,, 

Shout to the Lord of Glory ! 

Like waving corn in a fruitful land 

In ranks round the great White Throne they'll stand, 
Shout to the Lord of Glory ! 

This sung with a certain fervour and conviction of triumph 
— sinking down suddenly into the wailing refrain — 

Lord, do not long delay, 

Lord, wipe our tears away ; 

Through life’s long earthly day 
See how we strive and pray. 

As the singers, a company of some twelve or fourteen 
young men and women, came into sight, an instinct of 
good breeding made Lancelot Crookenden move a little 
away from his cousin. He rose to his feet and stood be- 
side her with a half-defined purpose of protection. 

Notwithstanding their vocal lamentations over the 
troubles of this world, and warmly expressed desire for 
speedy translation to a more satisfactory one, the singers 
in question came along the grass path merrily enough, 
their shadows lying slantwise across the hillside in the 
tender sunlight. The young women walked first, clinging 
together in little groups, their light cotton dresses and 
quick movements making them seem like some flight of 
bright, fearless birds. There was a pretty gay grace 
about them as they turned, from time to time, to pass a 
word or two laughingly with the company of young men 
following behind. — Sailors and fisher-lads, wearing roomy 
pilot-cloth suits or close-fitting jerseys, loitering along, 


24 


The Wages of Sin. 


hands in trouser-pockets, in lazy, swinging, sea-going 
fashion. Handsome, well-madej young fellows, some dark 
and fine-featured, others red-bearded and blue-eyed — eyes 
of a strange, dreamy blue that seem to reflect the joy 
and romance of the ocean as truly as they reflect its 
colour. 

As the procession passed, most of the young women 
treated little Mary Crookenden to inquiring glances, and 
whispered to one another comments on her tearful 
appearance. Lancelot tried hard not to hear. He wished 
they wouldn’t; what business was Polly of theirs? 
The men were discreetly indifferent, though several 
touched their caps in passing. One of them, a tall, 
sunburnt, young sailor, paused a moment, and spoke. 

* Parson Crookenden told us we might go down to 
Mouth, sir/ he said. 

* Yes, I know, it’s all right. How d^ye do, David ? ’ 
the boy answered, flushing a little at this recognition of 
his proprietorship. ' Mr. Crookenden told us about it. I 
hope you’ve enjoyed yourselves.’ 

There was a tittering among the nearest group of girls. 

‘ You’ve enjoyed yourself rarely, ain’t you, Steve ? ’ one 
of them called teazingly over her shoulder to a large, 
fair-haired, rather sheepish-looking man, walking a little 
apart from the rest. 

David glanced at her sharply and then addressed 
Lancelot again civilly enough — 'Yes, much obliged to 
you, sir. It’s my sister Jenny’s birthday, and nothing ’ud 
serve her and the other maids but they must have a 
picnic over to Red Rock.’ 

1 Who’s that ? ’ Mary asked, as the sailor moved away. 
' What made him look so cross.* 

4 Oh ! that’s David Parris. He’s an awfully nice fellow ; 
he’s second mate on board Sir Reginald Aldham's yacht. 
But they’ve laid her up now because of getting back for 
the partridges. And then he comes home here, to Beera, 
for the herring-fishing. What makes you say he was 
cross, Polly?’ 

' The way he looked.’ — Mary sighed, wearily, and put 
her hand up to her head. — ' I suppose we ought to go. 
It must be ever so much more than half an hour. But I’m 


Man and Maid. 


25 


so tired, Lance. I don’t believe I shall ever get home/ 
she said. 

Lancelot paused before answering. A daring idea sug- 
gested itself to him. But the same instinct that had 
made him get up from beside his cousin a few minutes 
back, told him it would be more becoming not to put it 
into execution before spectators, and two fresh figures had 
just come upon the scene. 

1 If you didn't mind, I believe I could carry you all 
right, Polly/ he said. ‘ But here are some more of these 
Beera people. We'll let them get by first.' 

In front walked a young woman, less well-dressed than 
those who had gone by already, but taller and more stately 
than they. The bodice of her old grey stuff dress was 
hardly full enough for the rounded bust it covered ; while 
her scanty skirts clung somewhat closely to her limbs as 
she moved. One hand was full of trails of crimson and 
yellow bramble leaves. In the other she dangled a rather 
dilapidated black hat. Her complexion had the peculiarly 
rich bloom on it, born of the moist, warm, West Country 
climate, which is almost startling to inland eyes in its 
richness. The coils of her dark hair had become un- 
fastened and hung untidily perhaps, but with an un- 
deniably picturesque effect, below her waist. 

Later in life this ripeness of colouring and opulence of 
physical development might degenerate into coarseness; 
but with the freshness of nineteen upon them they were 
unquestionably rather superb. Just now, too, the young 
woman’s beauty was heightened by a pretty sharp fit of 
anger, that made her full lips tense, and quickened the 
light in her grey eyes. She carried her head erect, and 
swung along with a fine air of concentration. All the 
world might have looked on, she would not have cared 
a pin. She was entirely engrossed by her own not very 
amiable or agreeable sensations. 

Following her rapidly along the grass-path, came a man 
of not, it must be owned, particularly prepossessing per- 
sonal appearance. One might judge him to be three or 
four and twenty. He was high-shouldered. His clothes 
had seen better days. Yet the aspect both of them and 
their wearer established, even at first sight, a social dis- 


2 6 


The Wages of Sin. 


tinction between him and the rest of the party. That he 
was a gentleman — in the wider application of that slightly 
offensive term — there could be no doubt, though he was 
by no means as responsible or even solvent looking an in- 
dividual as the majority of the sailors and fisher-lads on 
ahead. Slung across his shoulders he carried a bulging 
satchel, while the end of a japanned colour-box stuck out 
of one of his jacket pockets. 

Just before passing the boy and girl he stopped dead, 
and stood pushing up the moustache that lay like a rusty 
brown bar across his face, staring meanwhile in a curiously 
restless, intimate, comprehensive sort of way at little Mary 
Crookenden. 

On in front the singing had begun again, one fresh voice 
after another taking up the wavering tune. 

Oh 1 the pilgrims of Zion will find a sure rest; 

Shout to the Lord of Glory ! 

Like tired birds in a swinging nest 

They’ll be cradled to sleep on Abraham’s breast, 

Shout to the Lord of Glory ! 

As the last words grew indistinct in the distance, Mary 
Crookenden rose to her feet. For a second or two she 
stood looking full at the stranger — her slim, fantastic figure 
flaming in the slanting sun-rays, against a background of 
purple-brown heather and withering bracken. Then she 
turned her back upon him with a very telling little move- 
ment of offended dignity. She thought him ugly. And, 
her uncle l£ent and Chloe, her nurse, excepted, she strongly 
objected to persons who had the misfortune to be ugly. 

1 1 am quite ready, now, Lance/ she said, rather imperi- 
ously, in her full grave tones. 1 Do you hear ? I want to 
go home. I can quite well walk. Who’s that man ? ’ she 
added, coming close to the boy. * I don’t like him.' 

Lancelot was vaguely sensible of disliking the stranger 
also. Even more than of the inquiring young girls, he 
asked, ‘ What business was Polly of his ? ’ 

‘ One of those painting chaps from Beera/ he said, 
with a flavour of contempt. — The arts do not, as a rule, 
appeal largely to the mind of the British public-school 
boy. — ‘There are a whole lot of them about in the 


Man and Maid. 


2 7 


summer always, you know. Are you sure you’re not too 
tired to walk, Polly ? ’ 

1 What does he paint ? ’ Mary asked, with a sudden 
awakening of interest. 

1 Oh ! all sorts of things. I’m sure I don’t know, Polly 
— what they always do paint, I suppose. The village, and 
the quay, and the skiffs, and all sorts of things.’ 

1 You mean he’s an artist. Oh ! how I wish I had 
known that. Why ever didn’t you tell me at once, Lance ? 
I wish I could speak to him.’ 

Poor Lancelot was greatly perplexed by this unexpected 
ardour. He did not understand it . — 1 Why, Polly, how 
changeable you are,’ he exclaimed ; * two minutes ago you 
said you didn't like him.’ 

1 But I didn’t know he was an artist/ the little girl 
answered, quite excitedly. * Do you think he’d show 
me his pictures ? Do stop him, Lance, and ask him.' 

She ran down into the grass path, all her late exhaus- 
tion forgotten, and looked anxiously after the high- 
shouldered young man . — * Lance, Lance, come here. Come 
directly. He isn't gone far yet. Do stop him,’ she 
cried. 

Meanwhile the painter had overtaken the young woman 
in the grey gown. He was speaking to her eagerly. 
She paused, in obedience apparently to some question 
from him. and looked back. 

* I can’t see plain, Mr. Colthurst/ she said, impatiently. 
Her feelings were not under the best control, and she 
spoke in an unnecessarily loud tone. 1 1 can’t see 
plain, the sun’s in my eyes. But I expect it’s the little 
Miss Crookenden as is staying up to parsonage over to 
Brattleworthy, with the black nurse.’ 

1 Black nurse ? How on earth does she come by a 
black nurse, Jenny ? ’ he asked, stammering a good deal, 
and still looking in the direction of Mary Crookenden. 
' That is most suitably picturesque.’ 

The masculine and feminine standpoints are notably 
different ; and, let chivalry protest as it may, the former 
frequently has the grace of being the more modestly sen- 
sitive of the two. Even at fourteen promiscuous notice 
and interest appeared to Lancelot Crookenden to come 


28 


The Wages of Sin. 


perilously near insult. He was seized with a violent de- 
sire for escape. He did not want to hear any more. 

1 Come along, Polly/ he said, catching hold of his 
cousin’s hand and bundling her down the hillside by a 
narrow rabbit-track, with most unceremonious haste. 

‘ Oh ! I wanted to speak to him/ she cried, breathlessly. 

1 Why do you mind, Lance ? Let go my hand. You 
hurt. Why are you so rough ? ’ 

* He ought to have known we could hear/ the boy said, 
slackening his pace. * I haven’t really hurt you, have I, 
Polly ? But I call it awfully caddish to talk about you 
like that before your face.’ 

1 But it’s quite true what they said. I am staying at 
Brattleworthy, and I have got a darkey nurse. I'm glad/ 
she added, reflectively, 1 it is suitably picturesque to have 
a darkey nurse.’ 

Again Lancelot’s soul was disquieted within him. 
Strange, new, incomprehensible feelings again stirred him ; 
but he had ceased to find them pleasant, he had ceased to 
be glad. A vague, jealous displeasure possessed him. 
Was he unconsciously seeing further into, gaining a deeper 
experience of that same tremendous riddle of sex ? 

1 What have you been crying for, Miss Polly ? ’ the 
Rector asked her some half hour later. 

Lancelot had gone indoors, and the two were walking 
down the beech and sycamore avenue running parallel to 
the high wall of the Slerracombe kitchen gardens. 

‘Oh! I was foolish, Uncle Kent. I cried because of 
the rabbit Lance shot. It squeaked, and that made me 
feel badly, and I was ever so angry. Lance was very 
sorry. He didn’t mean to make me cry. He was ever so 
nice to me afterwards.’ 

Kent Crookcnden stuck out his under jaw, and the 
corners of his mouth twitched slightly. 

* The old story/ he said. ‘ A woman always likes to 
administer punishment herself — fall upon the culprit in 
hot haste herself, and then protect him vigorously from 
the judgment of far juster judges. Well, you make a capital 
advocate, young lady, though your pleading has a touch of 
the personal note. The man who gets you to undertake 
his case will escape with a pretty light sentence, I fancy.’ 


Man and Maid. 


29 


Unfortunately, however, Mary’s imagination was power- 
ful. The remembrance of the rabbit’s death shriek, of 
the scattered tufts of soft grey fur, of the shuddering 
blood-stained little body, was too much for her. 

* It was such a nice one, Uncle Kent,’ she said; ‘and it 
put up its ears and sat up. And it looked so happy. 
Why must people kill things ? It wasn’t doing Lance 
any harm.' 

‘ Ah ! there we have an awkward question — a question 
neither you nor I shall get to the bottom of in a hurry, 
Miss Polly. Poor little rabbit, like a good many other 
people cut off in the midst of his days — and then the 
reason of it ! ’ 

He looked down smilingly at the girl, whose great eyes 
were wide with questioning pity. 

1 However, if he was a right-minded, well-conducted rab- 
bit, no doubt he is safe in heaven by this time,’ he added. 

* I wish I believed that,' Mary answered, sadly. ‘ But 
Auntie Chloe says it’s only men and women have got souls 
that go to heaven.' 

‘ Does she, though, the old, spiritual aristocrat ! And 
how does Mrs. Chloe come to know that, Polly ? Has 
she ever climbed up to heaven to ascertain for herself 
what gains admittance there and what does not ? ’ 

‘ Well, Uncle Kent, I 'low you haven’t climbed up there 
either,’ Mary remarked. 

The sun had just dipped below the western horizon. It 
threw up rays of widening brightness towards the zenith, 
while the park and the vast levels of the almost white 
sea beyond, stretched quiet, singularly reposeful, below 
that gigantic, pulsing fan of saffron and pale primrose 
light. Kent Crookenden stood a short space gazing at 
the serene landscape, at the noble immensity of ocean 
and sky, and then looked down at the slim, orange and 
scarlet figure clinging to his arm. The fluted gold setting 
of the faded miniature had ceased to scrape his chest. 

1 Ah ! Polly,' he said, ‘ I am not so sure about that. 
I entertain a pleasing belief that I have been there once 
or twice, for a minute or so ; and that heaven proved to 
be a far roomier place than most pious persons down here 
are willing to picture it.' 


30 


The Wages of Sin. 


The miniature lay flat on his chest — an oval of weight, 
but a light one. In his own fashion, a silent one in this 
case, Kent Crookenden had personally, perhaps, solved 
the tragic, tormenting riddle of sex. 

Still that night, as the statuesque mulatto woman was 
engaged in undressing her little mistress, when the latter 
— after a graphic account of the events of the day, her 
glimpse of the real but, alas ! unattainable artist included 
— ventured to touch on her uncle’s delightful suggestions 
regarding the possible existence of celestial rabbit-warrens, 
Mrs. Chloe rejoined concisely — 

* Don't you berlieve him, honey.’ Adding, after a pause 
— * You’ll find, Miss Mary, darlin’, clever folks can talk 
a mighty ’mount of foolishness when dey done sot to.* 


Chapter III. 

It must have been past seven o’clock when Colthurst, and 
the young woman in the grey gown, turned off the main 
road at Beera Cross down the steep lane leading into the 
mile-long wooded combe, at the bottom of which lies the 
fishing village of Beera Mills. They had walked the four 
miles between Slerracombe and the cross road at a fair 
pace, still keeping, however, at some distance behind the 
rest of the party. Jenny still carried her head erect, and 
her face still wore an expression of annoyance. The 
young woman’s power of self-control was regrettably 
limited. She felt strongly and reasoned little — a combi- 
nation frequently leading to unfortunate complications. 

The sun had set some time. But the sky was clear, 
and the twilight lingered, covering the shadowy w^oods and 
steep slopes of furze croft and fern-brake on either side 
the road with a mysterious dimness. Bats darted to and 
fro on flittering, leathery wings, hawking for unwary gnats 
and flies. As the valley narrowed in descending, the 
hollow booming of the ground-sw^ell came up from the 
rocky shore far below, the sound seeming to get entangled 
in the thick leafy wood, and to hang there in a hoarse, 
continuous murmur. Now and again the stillness was 


Man and Maid. 


31 


cut by the sharp bark of a dog at some farm upon the 
high ground inland, answered by the plaintive bleat of 
sheep or lowing of cattle — by a laugh or snatch of song 
from the party of young men and women on ahead — by 
the plash and tinkle of the stream in its deep channel by 
the roadside, overhung with hart's-tongue and fragile 
lady-fern, trailing St. John's- wort, and delicate lilac gera- 
nium — by a sudden shiver of air among the light foliage 
of the birches, their pale stems gleaming ghostly against 
the dark background of beech and oak. From the wood, 
too, came a moist clinging odour of earth and rotting 
leaves, that mingled with the pungent peaty smell of the 
moorland. Overhead, showing faint in the dusky blue of 
the evening sky, were a few stars. 

An hour and a scene eminently adapted for the engen- 
dering of tender sentiments, for the perpetration of small 
follies. And now enter Corydon and Phyllis ! One can 
guess only too accurately what is likely to follow. 

I am bound to assert, however, that notwithstanding 
their provocatively poetic surroundings, this particular 
Corydon and Phyllis — Mr. James Colthurst, younger son 
of the late Dr. Ridley Colthurst, whose eloquence for so 
many years drew overflowing congregations to St. Saviour's 
Chapel, at Tullingworth (the living, it may be remembered, 
is in the gift of the Simeon trustees), and Jane Parris, 
daughter of William Parris, sometime able seaman now 
fisherman, of Beera Mills and local preacher among the 
Bible Christians of his native village and of the neigh- 
bouring parishes of Brattleworthy and Codd's Camp — that 
when these two young persons had passed the small 
church, clinging against the hill-side, and reached the 
deeper gloom cast by the steep woods on either side of 
the way, they appeared quite unlikely to take advantage 
of the excellent opportunity for love-making afforded them 
by their present circumstances. For Colthurst knew that 
his companion was the long-promised bride of her cousin 
Stephen Kingdon, a young sailor just home from a voyage 
to Odessa. While Jenny was vaguely but momentarily 
growing more convinced that whoever in the future might 
become Mrs. James Colthurst, that high privilege was not 
reserved for her. 


32 


Wages of Sin. 


This growing conviction — a painful one, it must be 
owned, to poor Jenny — was in part, at all events, the 
result of the young man's present conversation. Colt- 
hurst had a bad habit of holding forth upon any subject 
that happened to be uppermost in his thoughts, without 
careful consideration of its suitability to the feelings or 
intelligence of his hearers. He had a necessity for 
self-expression. For the last mile he had talked eagerly 
and persistently, regardless of very clear indications of 
vexation on the part of his companion. Perhaps Colthurst 
did not altogether object to vexing Jenny a little. She 
looked prodigiously handsome when she was angry. 

* It was not only the child's dress,' he said, * which 
made her so original. It was the startling contrast be- 
tween her dress and her expression. At first it seemed 
as if she was got up for a masquerade. There was a 
touch of positively tropical splendour about her. And 
then when you looked again you were reminded of all 
sorts of cold, pure, transparent things, of ice and snow. 
There was something polar, absolutely polar, in her little 
white face and those great eyes. They are that purple- 
blue, by the way, you only see in high mountain tarns.’ 

The young man’s speech was low and rapid, with a 
hissing prolongation of the sibilants. It was frequently 
broken by a hesitating stutter before certain consonants. 
This stutter increased distressingly under excitement. 
Colthurst frequently, indeed, found himself seriously in- 
convenienced by it. He was naturally somewhat irritable, 
and this thorn in the flesh, this inability to get his words 
out, caused him keen provocation, often making him shy 
and awkward just when he wanted most to carry things 
with a high hand. Alone with Jenny Parris, however, 
his tendency to stammer was agreeably in abeyance. 

* I have not seen anything so suggestive, so downright 
pathetic in the way of a child’s face for a long time,' he 
went on. 1 By the side of that stolid boy she looked like 
an exquisite little bit of Venetian glass beside a common 
earthenware beer mug. You say she is staying at Brattle- 
worthy, Jenny. Tell me some more about her.' 

1 1 don’t know any more, Mr. Colthurst, and what's more 
I don’t want to,’ the girl replied, impatiently. 4 She came 


Man and Maid . 


33 


down along one day last week — you were painting old 
Mr. Fulford up to Withacott — and she'd got a great, ugly, 
black woman along of her, just like the figure-head Aunt 
Sarah Jane's got put up in the garden. The children run 
and scotched as if they’d met a dragon. I don’t want to 
see her again. She was just the hideousest creature 1 
ever set eyes on.' 

Colthurst revelled in incongruities. There was un- 
questionably a sinister vein in him, a rather morbid enjoy- 
ment of all that is strange, jarring, unexpected, abnormal. 
Some persons, indeed, have gone so far as to accuse him 
of a love of actual physical deformity and a relish of 
horror for mere horror's sake. But this accusation, I 
think, is unjust. No doubt his power of appreciation was 
widely catholic, his view of beauty an original one. Yet 
he invariably, as far as I could see, rejected that which 
was unnatural or unsavoury, unless the presentation of it 
formed so essential a part of his subject that to omit it was 
to spoil the point of the story. If it was a necessary part 
of the drama, he portrayed it with an honest and fearless 
hand. And that he probably enjoyed doing so I am not 
prepared to deny. In truth, the number of artists — in any 
department — who have the gift of calling spades spades, 
rather than agricultural implements, is a very small one. 
To ask them not to exercise this distinguishing gift, 
when they do possess it, is a trifle hard. A trifle useless, 
too, perhaps ; for unless they are contemptibly false to the 
demands of their own talent they certainly will not listen 
to you. 

In the present case the notion of the swarthy nurse 
and little Miss Crookenden going down Beera Street, 
while the small natives scuttled away in terror, struck 
Colthurst as pleasantly grotesque. 

‘ They must have made a delicious pair,' he remarked ; 

1 1 wish I had seen them. Go on ; tell me some more, 
Jenny. Hideousest is very good in its way, but I want 
more detail, more local colour. How was the black woman 
dressed, now?' 

‘ Like a guy,' returned Jenny, promptly. 

Colthurst glanced at her in some amusement. He was 
beginning to know the tones of the young woman's voice 

D 


34 


The Wages of Sin. 


remarkably well. They were most expressive. Jenny, so 
her companion held at least, was a book printed in very 
large type and easy enough to read. He proceeded to try 
and read a little further. 

1 But did you happen to observe the child’s face carefully 
when we saw her just now ? ’ he went on. 1 She had 
been crying. It is not often a child cries to such good 
purpose. She was the embodiment of a whole tragic 
poem, with those red-brown eyelids, and blanched cheeks, 
and that glaring frock. -Just the kind of subject I care 
for. It taxes both one’s imagination and one’s technical 
skill. Don’t imagine these remarks are a bid for tears 
on your part though, Jenny,’ he added, glancing quickly 
at her again. 1 They would not suit you, they are not in 
your style.’ 

' Whether they’d suit me or no you’d not get mun for 
the asking, I can tell you, Mr. Colthurst,' she rejoined, 
hotly. 

Colthurst smiled as he pushed his moustache up from 
.his lip. It was really a pity the shadow of the woods was 
so deep just here, for he could not see Jenny’s face clearly; 
for he was under an impression that she was pre- 
eminently well worth seeing clearly at this moment, as she 
swung down the steep road by his side — her action as 
free yet as well-poised and harmonious as that of some 
Amazon on a Greek frieze. 

‘ Shouldn’t I get them, Jenny?’ he said. ‘Well, for- 
tunately I don’t propose asking for them, at all events 
not just yet. When I pack up my traps and bid good-bye 
to you and your delightful Beera you may pay me the tri- 
bute of a few tears if you like. I shall not be there to 
see the doubtfully satisfactory after-effects of them. I 
suppose it is really a merciful dispensation of providence 
that most women are anything but engaging when they 
have been crying,' he continued. ‘ For if they looked as 
that child did, one might be tempted to torture them from 
time to time — moderately of course — -just for the pleasure 
of sitting down and staring at them afterwards.’ 

Jenny made no immediate reply, but flicked at the bats 
circling about her head with the old black hat she still 
carried in her hand. Presently, however, disappointment 


Man and Maid . 


35 


getting altogether the upper hand, she broke out inconse- 
quently : — 1 She’s a proud enough little image, I'll be bound. 
They all are, those Crookendens — a proud, stuck-up lot. 
The boy’s the best of 'em, though you do liken him to a 
beer-mug, Mr. Colthuist. He's been on board the yacht 
a time or two with Parson Crookenden and Sir Reginald ; 
and Dave says a nicer, freer-spoken, civiler young gentle- 
man they never had aboard of her.' 

'Oh ! no doubt. He is just the sort of sleek, well-con- 
ditioned, young prize animal everybody is safe to admire. 
That is exactly why I don’t admire him, you see, Jenny. 
His good looks are altogether too obvious.’ 

1 They don’t belong to the place neither, those Crooken- 
dens don’t,’ the girl continued, glad to get hold of any 
subject upon which to vent her ill-humour without, as she 
flattered herself, betraying the real cause of it. ' The old 
man came from Bristol and bought it when Squire Tre- 
menheer died. There was Parrises living down to Beera 
two hundred years ago and more, Mr. Colthurst, before 
ever these Crookenden folks came about. If you don't 
believe me you can see it in the registers Parson Hawley 
keeps in the strong box up to church. Many's the time 
I've heard Aunt Sarah Jane and father tellin' about mun. 
If you don't believe me, Mr. Colthurst, just go and see 
mun for yourself.' 

Her vehemence greatly amused the young man. But 
Colthurst's amusement was of the observant, intellectual 
kind which rarely finds expression in laughter. For 
laughter, if it is genuine, usually implies a certain leisurely 
element in the mind, — a power of mental standing still 
and contemplating oneself and that fraction of the uni- 
versal economy immediately submitted to one’s notice in 
an easy, after-dinner attitude. It is hardly too much to 
say that James Colthurst’s mind never stood still. It went 
on and on, as his quick, noiseless footsteps went on now 
down the winding road, driven forward by the workings 
of strong, restless energy within. He was always thinking, 
doing, feeling, experiencing something — and that a per- 
fectly definite something. Always registering impressions, 
making observations, always feeding his somewhat lurid 
imagination with visions of future influence and renown. 

D 2 


36 


The Wages of Sin. 


Such a man has little enough time to waste in the society 
of dear, comfortable, lazy Laughter, with its epicurean 
acquiescence in things in general — itself included — its 
genial enjoyment of small surprises, and kindly gossipy 
appreciation of the manifold absurdities so continually 
visible in the ways of this cranky world. Colthurst re- 
garded the world as a nut to be cracked, an oyster to 
be opened ; at best as a battlefield whereon his talent 
and determination might win a great victory. The 
victory was some way off yet, for the young man's hopes 
were considerably happier than his present fortunes. But 
Colthurst had faith in himself. 

From the forgoing statement it must not be supposed 
that James Colthurst was one of those fortunate beings 
who, proposing to themselves the attainment of certain 
objects, proceed to walk straight along the shortest and 
surest road to the said objects, never looking either to 
the right hand or the left. He had two distinct sides 
to his nature which were for ever playing a game of 
skill, so to speak, with each other. Sometimes the in- 
tellectual side had the game all its own way. And then 
suddenly the emotional side, which had seemed curiously 
slow and short-sighted as to its opportunities of gaining 
the advantage, would in a few skilful moves come to the 
fore and cry c ieck y before its opponent had had time to 
organise any sufficient system of defence. Plurality of 
personality is very impeding and dislocating. To manage 
one human being is often hard enough work, heaven 
knows ! But to manage two — of whom the first is ardent, 
passionate, reckless, sensuous, sensitive, and the second 
strong, hard, ambitious, doggedly self-confident and self- 
assertive — joined together in an indissoluble bond of wed- 
lock, this is indeed a task from which a man, without any 
notable defect of moral courage, may well cry for de- 
liverance. 

Now, as Colthurst heard Jenny Parris' unnecessarily 
vigorous defence of the respectability of her own lineage, 
saw the toss of her handsome head as she swung down 
the road in the clinging dusk, the emotional side of his 
nature made a move forward. He was amused at her 
vehemence, but he was by no means displeased at it. He 


Man and Maid. 


37 


stopped and looked at her, leaning both hands on the knob 
of his walking-stock. 

‘Up-p-on my word/ he said, in that rapid whispering 
way of his, and with an access of stammering, ‘ if I was 
a conceited fellow, Jenny, I should b-begin to flatter my- 
self you were paying me the compliment of growing 
slightly jealous/ 

Jenny had paused also. She drew herself up to her full 
height. She was very nearly as tall as the young man, 
and the evening dimness seemed to magnify the proportions 
of her fine figure. She folded her arms, holding her head 
well back. Jenny’s attitudes were instinctively dramatic. 

‘Well,’ she answered, rather magnificently, ‘perhaps 1 
am a bit jealous. And some of the others would be jealous 
too, I expect, if they’d heard you tellin’ and tellin' about 
that little Crookenden maid like you have all the way back 
from Slerracombe. Of course I know well enough you 
ain't one of us, Mr. Colthurst. Your people are gentle- 
folks, and when you see gentlefolks you begin hankering 
after mun. It’s nature, I suppose; you can’t help your- 
self. But you’ ' lived along of us gettin’ on for six months, 
and our ways have been good enough for you. And now 
it 'ud aggravate a saint, that it would, to hear you so taken 
up with a little peaked-faced bit of a maid, just be- 
cause 

The girl broke off abruptly, and flicked at the bats with 
her old hat again. 

‘Just because what, Jenny ? ' inquired Colthurst. 

‘ Oh, you needn’t pretend you don’t know, Mr. Colt- 
hurst/ she replied, her voice rising in scornful emphasis. 

‘ Why, just because you think she’s a bit better than us. 
I tell you us Parrises are as good as those Crookenden 
people any day. But the only gentlefolks that go for any- 
thing worth namin' are the ones as have the money.' — 
Jenny began striding down the hill again. : — ‘We’ve bin 
deceived in you, Mr. Colthurst,' she said, fiercely. ‘ We 
ain't of any account with you after all, though you have 
let on to seem so friendly, coming out along of us to-day 
when Dave asked you and all. There, then ; go along 
back to your gentlefolks if you’re so set on 'em, Mr. 
Colthurst — that's all I’ve got to say.' 


38 


The Wages of Sin. 


These last words appeared to the young man to have a 
decided flavour of sarcasm about them. They nettled him 
considerably. 

' They would be so d-delighted to receive me, wouldn't 
they ? ’ he replied, stammering badly. * A poor, seedy 
devil of a painter, worse dressed than their footmen, is 
so likely to find the doors of great houses thrown open 
to welcome him. As you very truly observed just now, 
money is the only thing that tells — not talent, not birth. 
It d-doesn’t matter who you are or what you can do, if 
your pockets are empty you go under.’ — Colthurst set his 
teeth and cut savagely at the ferns edging the brook. 
— < But I tell you p-people are a good deal mistaken if 
they imagine I am going to stay under. I know the 
worth of my work if no one else does. The world will 
have to reckon with me one of these days. And I'm not 
soft. It’s bound to come in time. I can wait.' 

The girl made no answer. Often she had but a vague 
understanding of her companion’s talk. It was, to use a 
colloquialism, very much over her head. And then, as in 
the present case, it seemed to widen the social distance 
between them cruelly. Poor Jenny dumbly but very bitterly 
resented all such widening. 

About half-way down the combe a bridge of rough 
slabs of slate spans the brook, and gives access, by 
means of a gate, to a rutted cart-track leading up through 
the wood to a disused stone-quarry. This cart-track is 
bordered, for the first thirty yards or so, by a larch plan- 
tation, which, as the evening air stirred the branches, 
gave off a resinous fragrance. Colthurst paused and 
turned aside to inhale il. These fresh woodland scents 
were peculiarly delicious to him. There is a certain 
unhistoric purity, so to speak — a disconnectedness with 
man and the doubtfully profitable ways of him — in the 
odours and aspects of sylvan vegetation that is eminently 
refreshing. To Colthurst his fellow mortals were absorb- 
ingly — in a sense, offensively — interesting. They pos- 
sessed such splendid powers; and were, at the same time, 
to his thinking, so hopelessly weighted by stupidity; nearly 
all of them so obstinate, so secure of their individual in- 
fallibility, yet so few of them grasping their own lives as a 


Man and Maid . 


39 


whole and knowing definitely what they purposed doing 
with the years of nights and days accorded to them upon 
this ver} r extraordinary planet. And it was just because 
of his strong and constant consciousness of the claims and 
all the perplexing phenomena of humanity, that the un- 
humanity of the woods so attracted him. Trees rooted 
always in the same place — permanent, peaceful, resigned, 
undesiring beings, with their marvellous complexity and 
variety of beauty, their passionlessness — these pleased him 
better than the birds and insects, whose lives are, on a 
simpler scale, and in primitive proportions, ruled by the 
same needs, and motives even, as our own ; better than 
the emotional, fugitive loveliness of flowers ; better than 
the streams, hurrying so restlessly, persistently towards 
annihilation in the sea ; better than the sea itself, majestic 
though it is in its mateless, unfruitful immensity and 
strength. 

The effect upon Colthurst of a few seconds' communing 
with the larches was soothing, and found expression in 
the more amiable tone he adopted towards Jenny Parris. 
He imagined her silence to be the result of sulkiness. He 
was aware of having been somewhat egotistic during their 
walk together this evening, and of having omitted to pay 
her words — Colthurst had so far abstained from mere ob- 
jective testimony to his admiration for her good looks — 
the amount of personal attention she unquestionably liked. 

‘ Come, Jenny,' he said, presently, ‘what is the use of 
our quarrelling ? Let us wait here a little while. There 
is no hurry, and, at this rate, we shall overtake the others 
almost directly. You needn't grudge me a few minutes' 
chat. You^ will have plenty of Steve Kingdon’s society 
when I am* gone — have it for the remainder of your and 
his natural lives, in fact. A little abstinence now will 
probably increase your appetite for it. And it is well 
to begin, at all events, with a large appetite for the in- 
evitable.' 

Jenny had turned to him quickly when he began speak- 
ing. But now she moved away impatiently towards the 
rough bridge. 

4 What is there to be so cross about, after all ? * Colt- 
hurst continued, following her, his interest in the girl 


40 


The Wages of Sin. 


increasing in proportion to her apparent indifference. 1 You 
may just as well behave prettily to me while 1 am here. 
You can behave uncommonly prettily, you know, Jenny, 
when you like. I shall have a dreary enough time of it 
grinding away at pictures which that great composite 
idiot, the British Public, hasn't the sense to understand 
and buy, when I go up to London again. Whereas you 
have no end of splendours ahead. You'll be thinking 
of being married, and having a smart house in Yeomouth 
and coming out as no ei of a fine lady, if Steve gets 
a good berth. Will you ever think of me, I wonder, 
Jenny ? Will you send me an invitation to the wedding ? ' 

1 There won't be no wedding,' she answered, tossing up 
her head. 4 Me and Steve's parted. We had words about 
it to-day. He swears he wouldn't have me now if I kneeled 
down to ask it of him.' 

Colthurst drew in his breath with a queer little hiss. — 
1 Wouldn't he? More fool he,' he said. 

Jenny crossed the bridge and leaned her elbows on the 
top bar of the gate. She was not much given to tears, 
but at this moment they rushed hot and smarting into her 
grey eyes. For she was very miserable, poor child ; and 
it was only vanity which kept her from crying. Had not 
Mr. Colthurst intimated that tears in all probability would 
be anything but becoming to her ? 

Colthurst, meanwhile, was considerably startled by the 
piece of information just conveyed to him. It made a 
difference in his relation to his companion. 

1 W-why have you and Steve parted ? ' he inquired. 

The girl hesitated . — 1 Steve didn’t fancy you paintin’ me 
so often.' 

1 Oh ! I am the serpent in paradise, am I ? ' * Colthurst 
exclaimed. 1 Really, Mr. Stephen Kingdon’s susceptibilities 
are remarkably easily aroused.' — He paused; and then 
said, rather hardly, * I have never made love to you — 
honestly now, Jenny — have I ?’ 

1 No, never,’ she answered, the words, for all her desire 
not to cry, shaken by a sob. Then Jenny straightened 
herself up, and broke out stormily — 1 But they won't 
believe that. They're, all of mun, always on at me 
about you — except Dave. Father’s always tellin’, and 


Man and Maid. 


4i 


\ 

then Aunt Sarah Jane, she must go and chime in. She's 
always been set against Steve and me marryin', and 
she’s pleased enough to take hold of this about you 
and the paintin'. She’s always spying on to me, and 
publishing tales about my carryin' on till the town rings 
with ’em.' 

Colthurst drew the end of his moustache between his 
teeth and bit it with a sort of rage. He was immensely 
annoyed at this revelation of local gossip. He had been 
very happy — happy, that is, in so far as is possible to a 
person of his restless, feverish imagination — during his 
six months' sojourn at Beera Mills. He had gone down 
there sore from disappointment caused by the rejection of 
two of his pictures — they sold years afterwards, I re- 
member, for large sums of money — by the Royal Academy. 
And the shrewd, humorous, handsome fisher-people had 
been kindly and cordial towards him. Colthurst was very 
sensible of kindness, not having met with any great super- 
fluity of it so far — by his own fault, in part, no doubt. He 
had felt grateful to them. And gratitude had a softening, 
sweetening influence upon him. He held, too, that his 
conduct in respect of Jenny Parris had been really irre- 
proachable. He had let her see, no doubt, something of 
the admiration in which he held her remarkably ripe and 
vigorous beauty. That had been unavoidable. But a 
sense of noblesse oblige had prevented his indulging in 
tender passages with her. And now he found himself 
accused of an ordinary vulgar intrigue ! It was immensely 
annoying. And Colthurst was, possibly, all the more con- 
scious of his own unimpeachable virtue and the odious 
injustice of the public, because his code of ethics in 
questions of the affections was not a very stringent one. 
His personal vanity was somewhat wounded moreover. 
For he saw he had been mistaken concerning the root of 
Jenny’s ill-temper. It arose not from jealousy, which 
would have been complimentary ; but simply from chagrin 
at the loss of her old sweetheart. 

Colthurst had followed the young woman across the 
rough bridge. Now he stood a couple of steps behind her, 
inwardly cursing the censorious impertinence of the in- 
habitants of Beera Mills. 


42 


The Wages of Sin. 


Finding he did not answer her, Jenny turned away 
hopelessly, and leaned her elbows on the top of the gate 
again. Her voice was thick with tears she still struggled 
not to shed, as she said — 

1 Oh ! it’s a poor life for a motherless maid up to our 
place — always short of money and put to shifts. It was 
bad enough when half the takin's went in liquor, but we'm 
worse off than ever now father's gone and got religion 
like he has. Days and days he won't put the boat out 
because he's going flacketting over to Nettlecombe or up 
to Codd’s Camp to preachin's and prayer-meetin's and an- 
niversaries. He says the Lord's given him higher work 
to do than the fishin'. All I know is, the herrin's paid 
best. And so I'm forced to wear this old gown that's a 
shame to be seen beside the other maidens'. Fay, what’s 
that?’ she cried out, shrilly, reeling back from the gate 
right against James Colthurst as he stood beside her. 

Only a white owl sailing out from among the fragrant 
larches, beating silently a little way down the road, and 
then disappearing, with a weird, half-human laugh, into 
the wood across the glen. The worthy bird was wholly 
intent on personal matters — probably matters of supper. 
Like Esau of old, he was in search of savoury meat such 
as his soul loved — a belated field-mouse, for instance, 
or some other succulent, defenceless creature in fur or 
feathers. But we all of us, at times, I suppose — owls 
included — though, in our own opinion, going very inno- 
cently about our private business, appear as the messengers 
of fate to others, and set in motion those mysterious mag- 
netic currents that determine, for joy or sorrow, the future 
of other lives. So to half-educated, superstitious Jenny 
Parris, in the midst of her present excitement and keen 
self-pity, the greedy, wide-winged barn-owl appeared as 
she knew not what vision of supernatural terror. And 
before she could recover herself Colthurst’s arms were 
round her. He had flung them out instinctively to save 
her from falling. 

It was all done in a very brief space of time. Flint struck 
steel, and the flame leapt up ; for, as the young man felt 
the girl's heart beat fast under his hand, in the moist 
dimness of the twilight, with only those few faint stars 


Man and Maid. 


43 


looking on, the emotional side of his nature, unfortunately* 
made a resistless dash right across the board, and, almost 
before the cool, calculating side realized what had hap- 
pened, cried mate. 

1 Jenny, Jenny/ he said, hoarsely, a singular vibration in 
his voice. 

Jenny started, drew back a little, looking him full in the 
face, her lips parted, and an intense though silent inquiry 
in her eyes. Still she did not make any effort to shake 
herself free of his arm. 

A long sighing draught of air crept up the valley, cool 
off the sea, bearing on it the sullen booming of the 
ground-swell, and the voices of the young men and wo- 
men, sad and sweet, as they rose once more in the refrain 
of the old hymn — 

Lord, do not long delay ! 

Lord, wipe our tears away. 

Through life’s long earthly day 
See how we strive and pray. 

And somehow, before the last lingering, plaintive notes 
died away, Colthurst’ s and Jenny’s lips met. It was not 
all his doing. Jenny raised her proud head, not unwilling 
to give as well as to receive that first kiss. Then they 
moved apart, and stood looking strangely at each other 
through the colourless dusk. 

Colthurst was the first to speak. The emotional side 
still had the upper hand, and he did not choose his words 
very wisely. — ‘Upon my word/ he said, ‘I b-believe 
you have a little liking for me, Jenny, after all.’ 

‘ Liking ! ’ she cried, with something between laughter 
and a sob. ‘ Why, I'd walk round the world barefoot after 
to you, Mr. Colthurst ; you know it.’ 

But as it happened the young man had not known it. 

‘ G-good Lord/ he stammered, under his breath. 

Putting up his hand and thrusting the fingers inside his 
turned-down shirt collar, he dragged it outward. It seemed 
to choke him. He was fairly confounded. 

If he had been playing unadvisedly with edged tools, he 
seemed likely to get cut with a vengeance. For an instant 
it occurred to him that all this — the lonely walk, the girl's 
lamentation — was a conspiracy, which had been planned 


44 


The . Wages of Sin. 


beforehand and carried out by the help of a third person. 
Colthurst’ s opinion of the honour of his fellow-creatures 
was not an exalted one. Most of them were capable, 
he thought, of exhibiting alarming ingenuity in compassing 
their own ends. But he rejected this explanation, after 
momentary reflection, in disgust. These fisher people 
were unsophisticated, and there was a sturdy indepen- 
dence about them. They were too proud, he believed, to 
stoop to a dirty trick of that description. Moreover there 
had been a ring of honesty in poor Jenny's crude de- 
claration of affection that was indisputable. 

All these thoughts flashed through Colthurst' s brain with 
amazing rapidity. But to Jenny, in her present condition 
of unruly excitement, the pause seemed intolerably length}'. 

1 You’m playing with me, Mr. Colthurst,' she cried, her 
voice quivering with passionate emotion. 1 You've been 
and made me tell. You wouldn’t let me be. You knew it 
well enough all along, but you think it rare fun to bring 
me down and shame me. I liked Steve well enough till 
you come, but now I can’t abear the sight of him. Why 
ever did you come here, and tell to me, and make me love 
you? I'll never be able to hold up my head in Beera 
again. They'll all sneer and throw it up against me that 
—that ” 

I suppose it was reprehensibly weak of James Colthurst, 
but Jenny's voice rising in piteous anger and despair was 
a little more than he could endure . — 1 Hang it all ! ’ he said, 
desperately. Then he took the girl in his arms again, and 
held her. 

1 Poor, d-dear, beautiful, foolish Jenny,' he said, in that 
quick, broken, whispering way of his. ‘ There, kiss me 
again. D-don't cry so. There, it's all right. I love 
you. Will that pacify you, Jenny? Upon my word, I 
love you.' 


Chapter IV. 

Berra town consists of some forty or fifty slate-roofed, 
whitewashed houses, clustered together at the lower end 
of the valley where it opens in a great green V upon 


Man and Maid . 


45 




the Atlantic. Before you are three thousand miles of ocean, 
clear and free, so the natives with their little turn for 
fine phrases tell you, to Labrador. Behind you, working 
back inland, turning upon itself like some gigantic serpent, 
is the long wooded combe. A bit of a very primitive 
world, this. For probably the distribution of moorland, 
wood, and water is almost the same now as when the 
Roman legionaries began constructing the road up above, 
which runs due west — straight as a bee-line, up hill and 
down dale — from the pleasant, steep-streeted town of Yeo- 
mouth, on the estuary of the tide river, to Buckland Head, 
the extreme point of the iron-bound coast. The road has 
a certain dignity and impressiveness about it, though given 
over in these days chiefly to farmers' and fish-jowders' 
carts, to carriers' hooded vans, and donkeys labouring 
under bags of sand or panniers full of herrings. For it 
shows blanched and yellowish as the coarse grasses of 
the marsh and bog it here and there crosses, cutting its 
way across the face of the country fearlessly and relent- 
lessly, unswerving as the forward march of civilisation 
which it seems to typify. 

Beera, however, as has already been shown, lies well off 
the course of the high road. Forward-marching civilisa- 
tion, even in its modern form of the ubiquitous tourist, 
has left the little place fairly unmolested as yet. The 
first few cottages in the street stand back, each set in a 
patch of steep garden, bright with the glossy leaves and 
pink, blue, and lilac heads of hydrangeas, while tall red- 
stemmed fuchsias, myrtles, and Virginian creeper— ^at this 
season of the year all colours from buff to dark crimson 
— are trained against their white-washed walls. In two 
or three places are agreeably original linhays or donkey 
stables — an oblong enclosure of tarred planks, roofed in 
with a derelict herring boat turned keel upwards. In front 
of the cottages, the stream brawls along its rocky channel, 
crossed by half a dozen little bridges, made, like that in 
the wood, of purple-grey slabs of slate. At the back of 
them rises some five hundred feet of rough pasture and 
common-land, very much set up on end. In places it 
is broken up into small potato fields, but for the most part 
retains its original character of sheep-walk and warren. 


46 


The Wages of Situ 


As you get into the heart of the village the houses 
gather closer together ; until at last they seem to jostle 
each other, actually to crowd and climb upon each other 
in their anxiety to witness all that goes forward in the level 
unpaved space commonly known as The Square. This, 
indeed, forms the grande place of Beera town. It is 
fronted on the left by the low, dusty buildings of the 
flour mill ; the great, brown, creaking, dripping wheel of 
which is turned by a branch of the stream. Towards the 
sea the exits from the square are twofold. One, a nar- 
row passage between a couple of green-balconied houses, 
ends in a flight of steps, leading up to a row of tumble- 
down red cob cottages that cling to the very edge of the 
cliff' some fifty feet above the beach. The other, a slanting 
rocky road blasted out of the cliff-face, protected by a low 
wall, and supported in places by huge buttresses of 
masonry, leads down to a limekiln — partially blocking the 
end of the gulley through which the stream empties itself 
— and to the small, grey, sickle-shaped pier, which guards 
the quay pool, and the boats and skiffs moored in it from 
the fury of the western sea. 

Both place and people strike you, at once, as having a 
curiously foreign aspect. The former closely resembles 
one of the picturesque and inordinately smelly fishing- 
villages — Beera, save for an all-pervading odour of herrings 
in the late autumn, is sweet enough — that nestle at the 
foot of the Apennines along the beautiful Ligurian coast. 
The people, however, dark-skinned and black-haired 
though so many of them are, do not approximate to the 
soft and too often fleshly Italian type. They have a 
neatness of make, a keenness and fineness of feature, a 
native dignity of bearing, a certain hard strain, in short, 
in their good looks, which differentiates them sensibly 
from the natives of the Riviera. 

I cannot vouch for the truth of the story, but tradition 
tells how, in the. year of grace 1588 — when Nature took 
up her parable against foreign aggression, bidding stars 
in their courses, wind, wave, and tempest fight against 
that grim and bloody-minded prince, Philip the Second of 
Spain, and scatter the wrecks of his Invincible Armada 
on all the British coasts — a Spanish galleon, driven into 


Man and Maid \ 


4 7 


Yeomouth Bay by stress of weather, was cast away upon 
the long reef of black rock that runs out from the back of 
Beera Quay. Tradition tells, further, how the swarthy 
southern sailors, worn, storm-tossed and disheartened, 
made their way up — the few that escaped of them — sadly 
and humbly into the little, white-walled, English town ; and 
cried to each other, even as the weary seamen of Odysseus 
cried to each other, resting on the yellow sands of that 
strange land 1 in which it seemed always afternoon ' — cried 
that they would ‘ return no more ; ’ but forgetting home, 
and wife, and child, the vineyards and pomegranates, the 
song and dance, the sunshine, and the cruel tyranny of Spain, 
they would stay here for ever in the fair, smiling, tender- 
hearted West Country. — And so, indeed, like Odysseus’ 
seamen they did stay. But with this slight difference, that 
whereas the old Greek sailors spent their time sluggardly, 
lying on beds of ‘ amaranth and moly,’ and muddling their 
brains with lotus eating, these other castaways spent 
theirs in the more profitable occupation of catching ling, 
and cod, and hake, and herring; and in wandering — the 
younger and more sentimental of them, I suppose — waist- 
deep in bracken and purple foxgloves on the hillside; or 
mingling their rich, sonorous, foreign speech with the 
cry of the plover and laugh of the gulls, and the long- 
drawn, sibilant murmur of the sea, as they sat on the 
short turf beneath the white hawthorn thickets in the 
springtime and talked of the land they would never see 
again. Tradition adds finally — but then tradition is a 
suspiciously wide-mouthed gossip — that the dark-browed 
seamen found favour in the sight of the slim West Country 
maidens, so that these married them and bore them 
beautiful wild-eyed children, whose descendants remain 
at Beera even unto this very day. 

This legend, whether true or false, had pleased Colt- 
hurst's fancy from the first. It was very present to him 
now, on the night of Jenny Parris’ birthday party at Red 
Rock Mouth. 

The young man still found himself in a rather perturbed 
state of mind, unable either to draw or to read. So he 
loitered out from his lodgings at a green-balconied house 
in the Square, and sat down on the sea-wall guarding the 


48 


The Wages of Stn. 


road to the quay. Jenny had gone home to one of the 
red cob cottages perched on the edge of the cliff some 
time ago. And the last of the herring-boats, not without 
a shouting from the men and splashing of the long 
sweeps as the wash struck her in rounding the pierhead, 
had sailed out to take up her place and drift all night 
with the rest of the fleet dotting the bay. Beera town 
was silent, having apparently put on its nightcaps, and 
put out its candles, and retired discreetly to bed. The 
only sounds were those of the stream rushing down the 
gulley, and the growling grind of the ground-swell among 
the loose pebbles of the beach. 

Colthurst sat with his back to the sea, staring aimlessly 
at the wall of rock across the road. He thought of Jenny 
Parris and of the shipwrecked Spanish sailors, wondering 
whether the story might not very well be true — whether 
the girl, indeed, might owe some of her stately beauty 
and the violence of her emotions alike to this old strain 
of alien blood. Her lately-declared passion for himself 
had an exotic flavour; a heat, a suddenness, a dash of 
reckless romance, very unlike the ordinary orderly, hum- 
drum loves of the ordinary, sober Briton. And this exotic 
vehemence of Jenny’s love piqued and gratified Colthurst. 
It was distinctly moving and exciting. He wondered how 
it would end. 

Yes, began to wonder that already. For in his present 
solitude the cool reasonable side of his character soon 
began to take up the game again. Colthurst was becoming 
disagreeably aware that he had ended by making a very 
sufficient fool of himself and talking a large amount of 
abominable nonsense between the gate into the wood and 
the first cottages in Beera Street. And the awkward part 
0i A was that he could not remember exactly w r hat he 
had said. He honestly wished not to deceive the young- 
woman or wrong her ; and in the heat of the moment he 
might have been betrayed into making her promises it 
would be impossible to keep. Any person of average 
sense would know that promises made under such circum- 
stances are subject eventually to very liberal discount. But 
then there came in the question, was Jenny Parris, in this 
particular matter, to be reckoned a person of average sense ? 


Man and Maid. 


49 


Colthurst shifted his position slightly. No doubt it 
was all very romantic ; but, he knew well, it is possible 
to pay too heavy a price for your romance. Had he not 
seen more than one young man, in his own profession, 
whose career had begun with a very fair measure of pro- 
mise, hopelessly handicapped, condemned to the everlast- 
ing production of potboilers by an early marriage or less 
honourable form of entanglement ? The situation was as 
common as lying. But Colthurst was indisposed to take 
it very seriously. He had been in tight places of the kind 
more than once before, and had managed to cut a suffi- 
ciently direct road out of them. 

For as Colthurst had said of himself, he was not soft. 
He had very definite ambitions, and woe to the person or 
thing that should come between those ambitions and their 
fulfilment. He would show himself somewhat remorseless. 
And this not so much from selfishness as from a profound 
conviction that he possessed unusual powers, and that he 
was bound to give them an expression as complete and 
unhampered as might be. It has become the fashion to 
narrow the meaning of the word conscience, and limit its 
operations to the sphere of practical morality, to the fatal 
cheapening of all literary and artistic labour. Some excel- 
lent persons, indeed, have run a trifle mad on this subject ; 
and have offered the world as a great and precious truth 
the palpably great confusion, that a good man and a good 
workman are synonymous. While some others, going 
even a step further, have added the even more pernicious 
fallacy that a bad man and a bad workman are equally so. 
Unhappily things do not move on such simple lines. It 
would no doubt be infinitely more convenient if they did. 
Whether James Colthurst was morally conscientious or not 
the reader is free to decide for himself if patience carries 
him to the final pages of this little history. But that his 
artistic conscientiousness was of a rare and noble order 
I can very confidently affirm. And it was precisely the 
working of this artistic conscience which made him, as he 
sat on the sea-wall, the sleeping village above and the 
sleepless sea below, realize one thing clearly, namely, that 
in the present state of his fortunes he could not indulge 
in the expensive luxury of a wife. 


s 


50 


The Wages of Sin. 


As to Jenny’s share in the matter, the young man had 
no great faith in broken hearts. The girl’s ardour would 
cool perceptibly, he fancied, when he had been absent a 
few weeks. When the excitement of his presence, the 
excitement of standing for him, of embodying, as she did 
with such remarkable dramatic instinct, the attitudes and 
expression demanded by the subjects of the pictures he 
had in hand — when this was over, all would be over, he 
thought, as far as he was concerned. 

Colthurst leaned his hand on the top of the wall, and 
turning half-round, restlessly, looked out to sea. A month 
or two hence she would probably make it up with her 
old lover again. Colthurst tried to be cynically amused 
at the idea. But, in truth, he was not very much amused 
at it. Like most other persons, he would have preferred 
both eating his cake and keeping it ; have preferred that 
Jenny should be faithful and yet he remain quite free. 
The emotional side of his nature had a word to say at 
this juncture. But he did his best to silence it with a 
little cheap philosophy. After all there were many Jennys, 
and more charming women far than poor, half-educated 
Jenny to be met with up and down the ways of life. He 
must look to the future to redress the limited indulgences 
of the present. When he had climbed the tree of fame, 
he promised himself a generous meal of the peculiarly 
delicious apples that are reported to ripen on its topmost 
branches. 

Unfortunately, as the majority have discovered in every 
age, the tree of fame is an inconveniently tall tree ; the 
trunk of it is abominably smooth, too, affording very little 
foothold to the climber. With all due respect to the young 
man’s talent, it must be owned that his canvasses were not 
at a premium. And so it happened, that before long, his 
thoughts wandered away from Jenny Parris, and even from 
her possible restoration to the arms of Stephen Kingdon, 
to dwell on certain unsold pictures, and on the unpardon- 
able density of dealers who had refused, commercially 
speaking, to have anything to say to them. The said 
dealers, however, were ready enough with their tongues in 
the direction of advice — advice as to the high desirability of a 
radical change in Mr. Colthurst’s style and choice of subject. 


Man and Maid. 


51 


But Colthurst, as he gazed away to the herring-boats 
drifting, tiny black specks, far out in the bay, swore to 
himself he would never change. He would starve rather. 
He built his work on sure foundations, on certain deep 
convictions, and to change would be to prostitute his 
talent. That which he believed, he must speak ; that — 
simply, fearlessly, regardless of unpopularity, regardless 
of contemptuous or even offensive criticism. 

To the presentment of the immediate and actual, as he 
saw it to-day, Colthurst had dedicated his powers. Per- 
haps this was in part a revulsion from the narrow Cal- 
vinistic creed of his youth, — its rather blasphemous notion 
that this world would be such a very much more satis- 
factory one if it had occurred to the Creator to leave at 
least half of it out ; its fierce refusal to accept the artistic 
and intellectual inheritance bequeathed to us by centuries 
of human imagination and labour ; its sullen placing of 
things lovely, lively, agreeable to the senses or wit, within 
the dreary categories of sin. In his revulsion from all 
this Colthurst undoubtedly risked losing his sense of pro- 
portion and relative value, and becoming an intellectual 
and moral universalist of a very advanced type. 

1 There was never any more inception than there is now — 
Nor any more youth or age than there is now ; 

There will never be any more perfection than there is now, 
Nor any more heaven or hell than there is now.’ 

These four lines pretty completely summed up the 
young man’s creed at this period. He had come across 
them a few months back ; and in reading them had felt 
that sudden turn in the blood which, in persons of sen- 
sitive organisation, so often accompanies a movement of 
keen intellectual satisfaction. They appeared to him illumi- 
nating in a remarkable degree. He subscribed to* them as 
to some Declaration of Independence and act of emanci- 
pation, setting his soul free from all bogeyisms and super- 
stitions, and giving him courage to look the world, as he 
found it, in the face, with sane, untroubled eyes. They 
gave the lie to the blighting eschatology that had been 
the bugbear of his youth. They presented him, to put it 
rather floridly, with a blank cheque on the universe, as- 
suring him at the same time of the solvency of that magni- 

£ 2 


52 


The Wages of Sin. 


ficent concern and its entire ability to meet any drafts he 
might elect to make on it. He repeated the lines to him- 
self now, as he watched the herring-boats, and found in 
them a source of strong encouragement. 

All the light left still hung in the west — a glistening 
whiteness lying over sea and sky, merging the confines of 
the one into the other, so that no horizon was perceptible. 
Owing to the projection of the headland just beyond, the 
road, the quay, the lime-kilns and the beach below were 
in deep shadow. Impenetrable obscurity was upon them, 
veiling and massing into one expanse of flat darkness the 
forms of all alike. The result of this distribution of light 
and shade was an optical illusion, which affected Colthurst’s 
imagination forcibly as soon as he perceived it. For it 
seemed as though the blackness around and below him 
was the limit of solid things, as though he was sitting 
on the extreme verge and looking down over the sheer 
gigantic walls of the earth as she rolled on through the 
pale immensity of space. 

It was very characteristic of Colthurst’s complex tem- 
perament that just when he had found stern comfort in 
the doctrine of immutability — the stability and continuity 
of phenomena as reason and observation present them to 
our consciousness — his senses should play this rather 
grisly trick upon him. He leaned on both hands and 
gazed into the deep gloom and vast colourless beyond, 
with a sort of giddy fascination. The little boats might 
be worlds, too, spinning millions of miles below in the 
great void. As for the hoarse murmur of the ground- 
swell, it seemed the voice of enormous air-waves, lapping 
for ever against the sides of the planet as she sailed that 
impalpable, shoreless sea. — The whole scene and the 
effect it produced on him reminded Colthurst of certain 
terrible impressions of childhood, born of illness and 
nervous excitability, and in particular of a recurrent dream 
which for a series of weeks had made night hideous to 
him. Now, after the lapse of years, the memory of that 
same dream produced in him strange sensations of 
mingled awe and attraction. Looking down into the dark- 
ness he was aware of an insane longing to drop over the 
wall and — well, — see what would happen next 


Man and Maid. 


53 


Colthurst distrusted such queer moods when they took 
possession of him. They alarmed him slightly. He 
wondered to what they pointed. Nothing was more dis- 
agreeable to him than the suspicion they suggested that 
his brain at moments was not quite steady. In the pre- 
sent case to convince himself beyond question that the 
world was round after all, and that dropping over the sea- 
wall would not lead to any interesting excursion through 
space, but merely to a congeries of painful compound 
fractures, if not to that permanent and final dislocation 
of the physical being, commonly known as death — he 
picked up a stone oft' the roadway and threw it over 
into the blackness, listening, as he did so, to hear it strike 
the ground below with a degree of anxiety which he 
felt to be absurdly weak-minded. 

He waited some seconds, but the stone apparently had 
not reached the ground. It made no sound. It had, in 
point of fact, alighted on a heap of wet sand piled up 
against the side of the lime-kiln. The silence was very 
distressing to Colthurst. Was the stone falling, falling, 
still falling, falling everlastingly into the infinite abyss ? 

Hastily stooping down, he groped with both hands 
in the roadway again. Found another stone, a large one, 
raised it with an effort, pitched it over the wall, and 
listened once more. 

This time the stone conducted itself in a reassuringly 
normal manner. It struck one of the buttresses of masonry 
with a clang, and then bounding outward, rolled down the 
beach and into the quay pool with a rattle and splash. 

The young man drew himself up quickly, an involuntary 
exclamation of relief on his lips. His forehead was damp, 
his heart was thumping against his ribs in a way that 
made his breath come quite short. Colthurst was ashamed 
of his agitation. It annoyed him acutely. 

* That handsome witch has contrived to turn my head 
to some purpose to-night/ he said to himself, rather 
savagely. 

Then he moved away with rapid, noiseless footsteps 
up the road towards the quiet village again. As he did so, 
a light in the upper window of the last of the old, cob 
cottages at the edge of the cliff caught his eye. Colthurst 


54 


The Wages of Sin. 


was feeling unpleasantly nervous, shaken, and conse- 
quently iK-tempered. He stopped a moment. 

* Ah, Jenny/ he said, half aloud, 1 1 am not very grateful 
to you, after all, for the gift of your heart. You have 
landed both yourself and me in a deuced awkward position. 
It won't do. And the sooner I get out of it the better.’ 

He turned and looked back once more at that ghostly 
pallor in the west. 

1 Whatever 1 may fling myself over walls, or tumble 
into bottomless pits of nothingness and go to the devil 
generally for, 1 can’t affoid to do it for you,' he added, 
4 splendid though you are in your way, Jenny Parris.’ 


Chapter V. 

We have just seen how James Co!thurst, claiming the free 
exercise of his individual rights of man, speedily began 
trying to extricate himself from the difficulty in which 
his contributory negligence — to use no stronger term — 
had gone far to place him. Jenny Parris' state of mind 
is worth passing attention also. For it is universally ad- 
mitted that to arrive at even an approximately just view 
of any affair it is necessary to call witnesses on both 
sides, since looks, words, and even actions, have a tiresome 
habit of lending themselves to almost diametrically opposite 
interpretations. In one sense, indeed, far from being 
stubborn, nothing is more elastic than fact. It can, as 
testimony, be stretched any and every way. And its 
elasticity is likely, alas ! to be tested to the uttermost when 
the interpreters of it are on one side a man, and on the 
other a maid. 

Jenny Parris, then, according to the manner of the 
majority of her sex, believing vehemently that which she 
wished to believe, had gone home to the last of the rickety 
cottages perched on the cliff, her heart overflowing with 
joy. Notwithstanding her unruly temper, the girl's dis- 
position was buoyant, hopeful, and loyal. Hers was one 
of those large, generous natures, which, with an almost 
unlimited capacity for running their poor heads against 


Man and Maid . 


55 


stone walls to the great inconvenience of themselves and 
others, have still an heroic element in them. 

Jenny’s expression was at once tender and triumphant, 
as she swung up the rough flight of steps leading out of 
the Square. Her love was returned, her vanity satisfied, 
her wounded pride appeased. She had an agreeable sense 
that her mouth, like the pious woman, Hannah’s, of old, 
was enlarged over her enemies — that rather too consciously 
virtuous person, her aunt Sarah Jane Kingdon, at their 
head. She had accepted unquestioningly Colthurst’s faith 
in his own powers ; and vague, but delightful visions 
of future grandeur, when he should be rich and famous, 
floated through her brain. She had told him the truth 
when she declared herself willing to follow him barefoot ; 
but during their walk from the gate up in the combe to the 
first cottages in the street, the young man's talk had — as he 
subsequently feared — given her every reason to believe 
that her devotion was not in the least likely to be put to 
proof of that kind. And so, naturally enough, Jenny’s 
thoughts turned in the direction of self-glorification. Fancy 
travels fast under such conditions. When the girl reached 
the doorway of the cottage and paused a moment on the 
threshold, unwilling to exchange the freedom and fresh- 
ness of the evening outside, for the close atmosphere of 
the kitchen within, she was occupied with vivid pictures 
of occasional returns to Beera in the future — Beera, humble, 
teachable, attentive — Beera, round-eyed with wonder at 
the brilliant fortunes of its once rather despised daughter. 

At the further end of the kitchen, a long room, low and 
narrow as the cabin of a vessel, his face towards the door, 
sat William Parris studying his open Bible. The aspect 
of the kitchen was not inviting. The fire had gone out, 
leaving the cooking-stove and the cavernous chimney-place 
a blot of blackness in the wall on the right, before which 
in resigned discomfort crouched an old sandy and white 
cat. Just inside the door on the stone floor lay a great 
pile of brown and yellow herring-nets, emitting a quite 
sufficiently perceptible odour of stale fish. The rafters were 
browned by smoke, and the walls patched with half a 
dozen different patterns of paper in varying stages of 
griminess. 


The Wages of Sin. 


i>6 


These sombre surroundings were a not inappropriate 
setting to the figure bending over the Bible. Parris was 
a tall, powerfully-built man, full-lipped like his daughter, 
but with fairer hair and bluer eyes than hers. If Jenny 
had any Spanish blood in her veins it must have come 
from her mother's side of the family. — His curly, grizzled 
beard, growing high on the cheek, was short and close, 
showing the line of his jaw. His bullet-shaped head was 
well set on a hairy, muscular neck, and his features were 
well distributed. In short, he would have been an unusually 
handsome man but for a long seamy scar running down 
from the outer curve of the left eye-socket to the corner 
of the mouth, that drew the lip up and back, exposing 
the canine tooth under the edge of his short moustache. 
This disfigurement, which gave an unpleasant, snarling 
look to the otherwise fine face, along with a certain disre- 
gard of soap and water (against which his daughter pro- 
tested in vain), made ’William Parris in his soiled canvas 
trousers and old blue jersey a figure, picturesque perhaps, 
but otherwise doubtfully agreeable. 

He was not a very good scholar. And now, as he sat 
reading, he followed the words diligently across the page 
with one blunt forefinger, while with the other hand he 
shaded the dip candle set in a broken china candlestick 
on the table before him, so as to concentrate all the feeble 
light on his book. But probably the very difficulty he 
experienced in deciphering the contents of the book only 
stamped its sonorous language more indelibly on his 
memory. 

Bill Parris' system of exegesis was very simple. He 
drew no distinction between history and parable, between 
statement of events and symbolic utterance. All to him 
alike was the Word of the Lord, mystic, sacred, life-giving. 
No miracle staggered his faith by its improbability, no 
story of revenge or ruthless war of extermination troubled 
his moral sense by its brutality. His moral and spiritual 
digestion, indeed, was not easily deranged. So his mind 
came to be saturated with Old Testament sentiment — 
Parris distinctly preferred the revelation of Sinai to that 
of Calvary — and packed with Old Testament phrases, 
which in moments of excitement he would pour forth, not 


Man and Maid. 


57 


without a kind of rude eloquence, in a stream of wild 
improvisation. 

This gift of prophesying was greatly admired by his 
hearers in the rough-cast little Salems, Bethels, or Provi- 
dences of Brattle worthy, Codd's Camp, and Nettlecombe. 
It was popularly reported of him that 1 Bill Parris held 
on to the Lord in prayer most amazin’.' The very incom- 
prehensibility and disjointedness of his discourses were 
regarded as sure proof of their supernatural origin. 
Scoffers, as we know, offer quite another explanation of 
such religious phenomena, and scoffers were to be found 
even in the neighbourhood of Arcadian Beera. Kent 
Crookenden, for instance, had taken a lamentably carnal, 
Gallio-like view of the matter, when old Mr. Hawley, 
troubled by the emptiness of church and fulness of chapel, 
had consulted him about it. He declared that, though 
Parris’ strong constitution had otherwise resisted the effects 
of drink, his brain had not escaped injury, and that he was 
in the first stage of that common enough form of religious 
mania, in which seeing visions and hearing voices alter- 
nates with fits of brooding melancholy. — ' Some day he 
will go mad enough to be shut up, Hawley,' he had said ; 
'and then Little Salem will be shut up too, and all your 
strayed sheep and lambs will come bleating back to you. 
Probably they will do so before the inspired lobster- 
catcher reaches the final dangerous or idiotic stage of 
mental disintegration. For even pious insanity palls after 
a time; and the Establishment is pre-eminently sane. 
Don’t be afraid. It’s a safe fold. Your people will be 
bored before long, and then they’ll hurry home to it.' 

To-night it happened that Parris was in a state of 
exaltation. The spirit of prophecy was upon him. He 
had been muttering to himself for the last half-hour. 
Now as Jenny paused in the open doorway, reluctant to 
exchange her fair dreams for the somewhat repulsive 
realities of the cottage kitchen, he raised his head, let 
the hand with which he had shaded the candle fall heavily 
upon the table, and began to speak. 

' Woe to the fulish virgins,' he cried ; 1 woe to the rebel- 
lious daughters. For they assemble of mun together. 
They go up along through the streets of the city wi' 


58 


The Wages of Sin. 


singin’, callin' on to one another — Let us put on our 
gudely apparel, let us go forth wi’ laughter, to the sound 
o’ the tabret an' harp. Let us go up to our high plaices, 
to the groves an’ plaices o’ the hill altars wi' feastin', yea, 
let us feast under the cedar trees, even the gudely cedars 
o’ Libanus.' 

Sometimes these outpourings alarmed Jenny. For though 
she criticised her father with greater freedom than filial 
piety, she could, not entirely shake off a half belief in his 
inspiration. More often they simply angered her. But 
to-night, full of her own thoughts, the girl paid little heed 
to his speech. Reflecting that when the fit was on him 
it was useless to hope for any rational reply to a question, 
Jenny remained standing in the doorway till the storm of 
words should be stilled. She stooped down, now and 
again, to caress the old sandy and white cat that had 
hopped across to greet her and was now rubbing against 
her ankles, purring hoarsely. The poor beast had been 
caught in a steel trap in the woods and had lost a fore- 
paw, so its movements were necessarily lop-sided and un- 
gainly. But Jenny, who was always touched by the sight 
of suffering, only cherished it the more tenderly for its 
misfortune. 

Whether the girl's indifferent attitude annoyed Parris, 
or whether he had reached the point of exaltation where 
the mind ceases to be affected by anything outside itself, 
I cannot say. He may have been prompted by half-con- 
scious malice, or the turn his w T ords took may have been 
purely accidental. The psychological phenomena presented 
by persons in his condition defy strict analysis. But after 
staring at Jenny for a few moments, he spoke again, his 
voice rising in tone : — 

* Woe to the fulish virgins, I say woe, woe unto mun, 
for the day o’ their tribulation cometh — 'e be nigh, yea, 
’e shall not tarry. Then shall they cry, but no man shall 
answer. The ears o' heaven shall be shet against the 
cryin’ of mun. For gudely apparel they mun have filthy 
rags; for the sound of the tabret and melody mournin’ 
and mighty weepin'. The wine o’ their feasts shall be 
spelled. Yea, it shall run down and the ground shall leek 
it up, the airth shall open her mouth wide an’ swallow it. 


Man and Maid. 


59 


Destruction shall overtake mun. Then shall they rise up 
and cry airly in the mornin’, and to the goin’ down o’ the 
sun shall they continue, because o' the inequity o' their 
doin’ s 

Parris paused, opened his wild, blue eyes wide, fixing 
them on his daughter, and spread out his large hands as 
in repudiation. His voice rose almost to a cry . — 1 But 
no man shall be found to petty mun/ he said, 'nor to 
zuccour their fatherless children/ 

His action, his last words, startled Jenny into sudden 
attention. The girl was still a good deal moved and ex- 
cited. And they seemed to cut across her bright dreams 
as a scythe cuts through standing grass and flowers, lay- 
ing them low in an instant. 

4 Father, father, what be tellin’ about ? ’ she cried out, 
hurriedly. 

Parris gazed at her vaguely again. Then his face broke 
in a smile, that was painfully distorted by the dragging 
back of the upper lip. His whole manner, even his accent, 
changed. 

' Who be you ? ’ he asked, with an air of childish 
curiosity. ' Where do 'e come from ? ’ 

' Why, father, are you mazed ? ’ the girl answered. 

‘ Don't you know me ? It’s me — Jenny. I’ve been along 
of Dave and a lot more of ’em picnicking over to Red 
Rock. Don't you mind it's my birthday ? ’ 

4 Go along with you ! you b’ain't Jenny, though you’re 
a likely maid enough,' he rejoined, with the same snarling 
smile. 4 She’s gone up over-stairs to bed wi’ her mammy 
an hour an’ more agone.’ 

He half rose from his chair, straining his eyes as 
though to see something at a distance, leaning forward 
and turning out his elbows as he gripped the edge of the 
table with both hands . — 4 You’m not alone,' he called out, 
sharply. 4 There be tu of 'e. Who’s the man a-looking 
over your shoulder ? * 

Jenny wheeled round, catching hold of the jamb of the 
door to steady herself. Her • father's expression and 
manner scared her, following immediately on his strange 
speech. Wheeled round with a quick, throbbing hope of 
finding Colthurst beside her, with a passionate longing. 


6o 


The Wages of Sin. 


not only for the joy and protection of his presence, but 
also that he might have come to claim her, here in her 
own poor home, and by a public avowal of his love set her 
sudden fears at rest. 

Alas ! not James Colthurst, but only her brother, David, 
was there behind her. Unmistakeable though his face 
was in shadow — for, as he half-sat, half-leaned on the 
palings on the other side of the little paved yard before 
the cottage, the upper part of his figure was silhouetted 
against that weird whiteness hanging in the western sky. 

1 Ask him if he’s going out to-night, Jenny/ the young 
sailor said, softly, nodding towards the open cottage door. 

Poor Jenny suffered a pang of bitter disappointment. 

* Come and ask him yourself/ she returned. 4 I can’t 
make no sense of him. He’s been sittin’ there tellin’ a lot 
o’ silly nonsense like he was clean out of his head.’ 

* No, no, you ask him, Jenny/ David repeated. He 
spoke slowly, and there was a thickness in his utterance. 

‘ I see Robbie Ching go down to Quay just now. He’s 
right under against the lime-kiln, and I’ll holler on to him 
to help put the boat out while I shift my clothes if father’ll 
go. Ask him, there’s a good maid.’ 

Jenny hesitated. She was excited, even nervous. For 
the first time it occurred to her seriously to doubt her 
father’s sanity. And in her present frame of mind she 
hated the gloomy little kitchen, its smoke-grimed rafters. 
Then tossing back her head defiantly, and pushing the 
herring-nets aside impatiently with her foot, she crossed 
the threshold and went up to the near end of the table. 

4 Dave wants to know if you’m going out to-night/ she 
said. 1 Most of the boats are out already.’ 

But Parris had sunk down in his chair again, and the 
forefinger of his right hand had set off on its slow journey 
across the page of the Bible . — 1 The Lord has cast mun 
out and put mun far from Him. He’ll set the feet of mun 
in slippery plaices, so that they’m bound to stumble an’ 
fall. Fall, fall, fall/ he repeated, smiling to himself with 
not precisely apostolic charity. 4 ’Tis written there be fu’ 
that be saved — a blessed Gospel, for I be one o’ .they fu’, 
praise the Lord ! 9 

Jenny threw up her hands with a gesture of painful 


Man and Maid. 


6 1 


helplessness. From the domestic point of view the pos- 
session of a private prophet is a doubtful joy, perhaps. 

* Father, father, let go your preachin’ and wake up/ she 
cried. 

Either the cloud lifted, or Parris elected to descend out 
of the clouds to the level of ordinary business. Five 
minutes later he staggered out of the cottage with the 
great pile of herring-nets across his shoulders. 

Then, and not till then, David having performed the opera- 
tion described as * hollering on to Robbie Ching/ came in- 
doors; and going into the little, dark, back kitchen proceeded 
to exchange his smart yachtsman’s suit for the miscellaneous 
garments suited to a long night of shooting and hauling her- 
ring-nets, and drifting on the wide, unquiet bosom of the bay. 

Jenny paid little enough attention to the black-headed, 
flannel-shirted young fellow, as he struggled into a much- 
darned jersey ; and, coming back into the kitchen, sat 
down beside the empty fireplace and began dragging on 
a great pair of sea boots, reaching half-way up the thigh. 
She sat with her elbows on the table, resting her head 
in her hands, pushing her fingers up among the masses of 
her dark hair. She was very unhappy. Her fair visions 
seemed to have fled, vanished, melted before the stern 
touch of familiar reality — her father, crazy, as she began 
to think him ; his strange talk, with all its sinister sug- 
gestions ; the ugly, almost squalid home, and its atmo- 
sphere, a sickening one to her just now, of poverty and 
toil. Jenny was, unfortunately for herself, by no means 
philosophic. Her power of striking an average was limited. 
She clung in passionate insistence to the thought of Colt- 
hurst and his promises; but both he and they seemed 
cruelly remote and unsubstantial just now. The girl’s 
present unreasoning depression was proportionate to her 
late unreasoning gladness. Hers was an excessive nature, 
disorderly in the violence both of its sorrow and its joy. 

1 Come, Jenny,' David said, presently, bending low and 
tugging at one of his boots ; — his heel had stuck in the 
hard creases of leather just above the ankle, and it refused 
stubbornly to go on. — ‘ Hurry up and get the lantern, and 
the can, and a bit of victual together. We’m so late as 
never was, already.’ 


62 


The Wages of Sin. 


The girl raised her head unwillingly. As she did so, she 
caught sight, for the first time, of her brother's face. 

' Dear heart alive, Dave,’ she exclaimed, ' you’m bleed- 
ing ! Whatever have you done to yourself? You've never 
been fightin'.’ 

' Yes, that’s exactly what I have been doing,’ he an- 
swered, coolly. 'And that’s why I wouldn't come in. I 
didn’t want father to get askin’ questions.’ 

Jenny looked at him in amazement. Good, steady-going, 
well-conducted Dave ! What was coming next ? 

' Whatever ' she began. But the young man fore- 

stalled her inquiry. 

' I may as well tell you about it now, I reckon,' he 
said. 'All the town’ll be ringing with it before morning. 
And you’d best keep out of Aunt Sarah Jane’s way for a 
bit, for I’ve been and spoilt Steve's bu-ty for him for the 
next week.’ — Notwithstanding his wounded condition and 
the awkward stiffness about his mouth, David could not 
repress a chuckle. — ' She set up a scritchin’ like an old 
hen having her neck wrung when she saw him come in,' 
he went on. ' She swears she’ll have me up afore the 
magistrates at Yeomouth, though I am own brother’s son 
to her. But I expect Steve won’t let her make a silly of 
herself like that. An' if she does, Parson Crookenden '11 
get me off somehow.’ 

' Whatever did you get fighting Steve for ? ' 

The young man rose and stamped his foot down into the 
boot. 

'To let him know he’d best pick his words a bit when 
he gets talking about you, Jenny,' he said. 

The hot colour rushed into the girl’s cheeks, and her 
eyes blazed. 

' And what’s he got to say about me ? ' she demanded. 

'Well, he seems to have a good deal more to say than 
I exactly cared to hear. He was publishin’ some fool's tale 
about what he’d seen, cornin’ home from Red Rock, of 
you and Mr. Colthurst sweetheartin’.' 

' If he says he seen any harm, he lies,' Jenny burst out, 
stormily. 

' So I told mum,’ Dave answered, busy over his boot 
once more. ' And to prove it I up and knocked the lies 


Man and Maid. 


63 


down his throat again. — Get the things quick, like a good 
maid. I must go/ 

As the young sailor turned out of the cottage into the 
still autumn night Jenny came close to him and laid her 
hand on his shoulder. They were a fine couple, the brother 
and sister, he in his rough, half-savage fishing clothes, she 
in her scanty grey gown, standing together in the dusk. 

1 Dave, you’ll not let him talk,’ she said, with a sort of 
gentle eagerness. 1 You’ll stand by me. It’s all right be- 
tween me and Mr. Colthurst. You believe me, Dave, don’t 
you ? I tell you it’s all right.’ 

There was a just perceptible pause before he replied, 

1 It had better be all right, or Mr. Colthurst ’ll have to 
answer for it, gentleman or no gentleman. But I wish 
you could have fancied one of your own people, Jenny. 
Beera folk's best. I don’t hold with furriners and furrin 
ways. I hoped maybe you’d take up with Steve again 
presently when he’s mended up a bit, and hasn’t got quite 
so many different colours about his eyes.’ 

David chuckled once more at the agreeable thought of the 
highly decorative countenance his cousin would present to 
society at large on the morrow . — 1 He'll be a sight and no 
mistake/ he added, with cheerful conviction. ' Take care 
of yourself, Jenny.’ 

And with that he stumbled away over the cobble stones, 
and down the steep flight of steps as fast as his big boots 
would allow. 

Jenny’s sleep was generally profound enough, notwith- 
standing the heat in summer and cold in winter of her 
little room close up under the thatch. The raftered ceiling 
of it sloped away so sharply that it was only in the centre, 
under the ridge beam of the gable, that she could stand 
quite upright. To get the big four-post bed, which formed 
its chief adornment, into the room at all, it had been neces- 
sary to remove the tester bodily. So that the posts, sawn 
off at half their height, stood up in purposeless, unsightly 
fashion at the four corners. But neither the poverty of 
her surroundings, nor the fact that the hardness of the 
wooden slats of the bedstead was but indifferently dis- 
guised by a straw palliasse and very meagre feather bed, 
usually interfered much with the sweetness of her slumbers. 


64 


The Wages of Sin. 


To-night I suppose, however, she was overtired with 
her walk, the day's not wholly successful pleasuring and 
its very varying emotions. For it was not till some time 
after Colthurst had ended his lonely vigil down on the 
sea-wall that she could make up her mind to put out the 
candle. And when at last she did sleep, her sleep was 
an uneasy one. She turned restlessly from side to side, 
much to the discomfort of the old sandy cat, curled up on 
the patchwork quilt against her feet. More than once she 
started and flung her shapely arms wide across the poor 
pillow, and moaned as though in pain. — For all the sounds 
and sights, the events and imaginings of the last twelve 
hours came back to her, jumbled together in a phantas- 
magoria of disconnected yet vivid impressions. — Again, 
with a sort of ecstasy, she felt Colthurst's kisses on her 
lips and his arms round her. Again she heard her father's 
voice rising in stern warning and bitter denunciation. 
Again she heard the mocking laughter of the owl. Again 
she saw little Mary Crookenden’s pale face and red eye- 
lids, as the child, in her brilliant orange and scarlet frock, 
stood in the soft sunset light among the gorse and heather. 
Jenny heard a shouting too, and saw struggling figures, 
and then faces — Steve Kingdon’s, her brother's, once Colt- 
hurst's, and that was worst of all — white, fixed, terrible, 
and dabbled with blood. 

In the grey of the morning the girl got up and opened 
the small casement window. Above on the uplands the 
day broke fresh and fair enough. But down herein Beera 
town all faas dim and still as death. The edges of the 
thatch above, and the straggling rose spray trained up 
beside the window, were furred with innumerable tiny 
drops of wet. While in the windless calm, the sea fog, 
warm, moist and ghostly, crept up stealthily, a formless, 
stifling greyness, over the little whitewashed village, and 
into the long tortuous windings of the wooded combe. 

I must remind the reader that all this took place in 
easy-going, old Parson Hawley’s time, long before Cyprian 
Aldham became vicar, and the sun of modern High 
Anglicanism arose on the bo ighted West Country parish 
of Beera Mills. 


Miss Mary Crookenden. 


65 


BOOK II.— MISS MARY CROOKENDEN. 


‘ It is wor» h the labour to consider well of Love, whether it be a God 
or a Devil, or a passion of the mind, or partly God, partly Devil, partly 
passion.’ — Plotinus. 


Chapter I. 

All the critics were in a flurry. They cackled up and 
down the columns of the newspapers and pages of the 
magazines like a pullet who has laid her first egg on a 
frosty day in December. And, yet in point of fact, none 
of them had laid an egg ; but had only found one, — which, 
with all deference to the talent of critics and high functions 
of criticism, is quite another matter. 

Still they cackled, and rightly. For it was a new sort 
of egg, an unexpected egg ; and their smartness, and know- 
ledge of the world, and literary gifts, and artistic acumen, 
notwithstanding, they were really at a loss to determine 
what kind of living creature might be inside it. One 
section of them, the younger, more progressive, and dar- 
ing, declared that it undoubtedly contained an eagle, des- 
tined to soar away up into the empyiean in most majestic 
fashion, till it stared, undismayed and unblinking in the 
face of the sun himself, carrying the future of the British 
art — as the Roc did Sinbad the sailor — aloft on its back. 
All of which modest little phrases read very well in print, 
when developed and enlarged on, and interspersed with 
allusions to Naturalism and Democracy, to 'the lifting of 
the veil of Isis/ to Maia, and the Modern Idea. Another 
section, the older and more conservative this one, took, as 
in duty bound — after reading the lucubrations of their 
contemporaries — a diametrically opposite view. They 
asserted that the egg in question was laid by no fowl that 
ever yet wore feathers, by no bird, whether of prey or 
innocently domestic ; but that its origin was reptilian. In 
their minds there could be no question about it. They 
therefore called on respectable persons, in the name of all 

F 


66 


The Wages of Sin. 


they held dearest, — prejudice, pocket, wife, child, hearth, 
country, not to mention the eternal salvation of their 
own artistic souls — to rally like one man, and leap upon 
that egg and the horrid possibilities as yet lying hid 
within it. To trample under foot, and generally murder 
and demolish it. While a third section, and this the 
largest — since the wisdom of unbelief commends itself 
by being a pre-eminently easy and cheap form of wisdom 
— elected to swear that there was no egg; or that, 
admitting an egg existed, it was of the sort commonly 
found in mares’ nests, which sort is invariably addled, as 
every one knows ; and that, consequently, it was equally 
silly and superfluous to make any fuss at all about it. 
And like most persons who take up a superior position 
and entreat others to be calm and not to make a noise, 
the noise which these preachers of common-sense and 
moderation made themselves was quite the most persis- 
tent of any. For, it is impossible not to notice, that of all 
cackles over public matters, whether great or small, none 
is ever so pertinacious and prolonged as the contemptuous 
and negative cackle. 

And, meanwhile, before the source and subject of this 
hubbub — a picture hung on the line in the large room of 
the Royal Academy — a crowd had gathered, and shifted, 
and broken, and passed, only to gather again — had 
chattered, and stared, and cheerfully pronounced judgment 
in less than three minutes upon work which had taken the 
artist months, possibly years, to execute — during six days 
out of every seven, continuously, through May and June, 
and on to the hot, moist morning at the close of July, 
when it is our purpose — after the lapse of ten years of 
silence — once again to pick up the scattered threads of 
our history. 

But of the picture itself, it is necessary to say a few 
words first. Under a sky of closely-packed cloud you 
looked straight down a field-lane, deep in slimy cart-ruts 
and cattle tracks brimming with water, to a space of dim 
moorland. This dipped towards a black peat bog in the 
hollow; while the rise on the right was crowned by a 
little, huddled, grey homestead, the rafters of its dismantled 
barn showing skeleton-like against the sky. Across the 


Miss Mary Crookenden. 


6 ; 


bog, the gorse and sedges were burning, smouldering 
sullenly, sending up pale jets of smoke, which, as the 
wind caught and beat them down again, trailed away over 
the rusty face of the moor in long lines. The whole was 
backed, save where the farm-buildings rose against the 
horizon, by a purple-brown gloom of low-lying winter 
woods. 

On either side the lane were crumbling earth banks, 
riddled in places by cavernous rabbit burrows. One was 
topped by a straggling hedge of oak and beech, to the 
lower twigs of which the leaves still clung thickly— the 
faded reds and browns of them being reflected in the 
shuddering surface of the muddy pools below. Opening 
on to this uninviting roadway a dilapidated five-barred 
gate, the spars of it splintered and broken, the rickety posts 
bleached by lichens and rot ; and leaning on the top bar 
of it, his back towards you, a tall, high-shouldered man. 

The painter had certainly not been guilty of any weak 
concession to the popular demand for what is superficially 
pleasant, graceful, picturesque. For the man's figure 
was, both in costume and attitude, uncompromisingly pro- 
bable, in a sense common-place. He wore a rough check 
shooting-coat that had seen a good deal of service. The 
pockets of it bulged. It hung loose and wrinkled below the 
shoulders as the wearer leaned his elbows on the gate. 
Of his face nothing was visible save the line of a low 
brow, of a deep-cut eye socket, high cheek-bone and 
heavy jaw, under a shock of reddish-brown hair. The 
presentment was simple enough. But there was a certain 
energy, almost fierceness in it. The man was strong, still 
you knew from the slouch of the whole figure he was 
tired. He leaned heavily. He was absorbed, too; ab- 
solutely indifferent to effect. You found yourself wishing 
he would turn round. For you wanted to know more — 
to learn the secret, the purpose, to read the past and fore- 
cast the future of that averted face. 

On the other side of the gate, some dozen paces down 
the lane, stood another figure. That of a young woman. 
She had paused ; suddenly, as it appeared, turned round, 
looked back. She held herself perfectly erect, her head 
thrown up, her lips parted in laughter. Her left hand 


68 


The Wages of Sin . 


was raised pushing back the loose coils of hair which 
spread, a dark cloud, above the rounded sweep of cheek 
and chin. The other was extended as in invitation ; 
while the wind, taking the skirt of her simple, grey-winsey 
dress and blowing it closely against her, revealed the firie 
curves of her form from waist to knee and knee to ankle. 
— An ideal woman of the people, primitive, vigorous, deep- 
chested, well-set on her feet, nothing feeble nor mesquine 
about her ; fitted to be the mother of healthy, handsome, 
firm-limbed children. 

Backed by that desolate landscape, balanced by the 
somewhat sinister presence of her companion, the rich, 
youthful gladness and promise of her personality seemed 
to show out as radiantly as the living reds of lip and 
cheek showed out from the sombre tones of cloud and 
moorland, from the mournful vagueness of the trailing 
smoke, and the glistering pallor of the foul lane. Yet 
looking closer, you perceived, for all her laughter, the 
woman was not wholly glad. Anxious in the midst of 
its gaiety, a strange force of appeal in the grey eyes, her 
countenance was a triumph of conflicting emotions, — its 
hopefulness weighted by an almost desperate question, its 
happiness shadowed by an almost tragic doubt, — as she 
turned with that motion of invitation to the man behind 
her, and looked him full, daringly, fearingly, in the face. 

The name of the picture was hackneyed. It made no 
attempt at originality. Possibly the painter had learnt 
the useful lesson that les verites betes are, after all, les 
veriles vraies; and consequently had considered it super- 
fluous to exercise his wits in the production of a new 
and startling title. He had christened his work ‘The 
Road to Ruin * without apology or explanation, and left the 
public to take exception at the familiar phrase if it pleased. 
Though, judging by the interest it was now exciting, his 
myddy field-lane seemed likely to prove, in his own case, 
no pathway of disaster, but rather — conservative or sceptical 
tempered critics notwithstanding — the highway to a great 
and notable success. 


Miss Mary Crookenden. 


69 


Chapter II. 

It was still early and the galleries were still fairly empty, 
when Cyprian Aldham entered the large room on the July 
morning in question ; and paused, catalogue in hand, 
looking about him with that fine flavour of reserve, of 
slight superiority, in his bearing and expression, which his 
friends commended as so well-bred, and those whom he 
did not honour with his friendship sometimes condemned 
as so impertinent. 

The fact that he was vicar of a remote West Country 
parish — that of Beera Mills — appeared to Mr. Aldham no 
sufficient reason for being out of touch with the affairs 
of the day. On the contrary, he rather plumed himself 
upon maintaining a close acquaintance with ' all that is 
going on/ as the phrase runs. He had not any intention of 
being left behind in respect of social or artistic, any more 
than in respect of religious developments. It would have 
appeared to him highly unsuitable that he should be left 
behind. For this young clergyman, though a charming 
and graceful person, was possessed of a very strong sense 
of all that was due to Cyprian Aldham both from the 
world at large and from Cyprian Aldham himself. He took 
himself quite seriously. Perhaps he never quite forgot that 
his cousin Sir Reginald Aldham being childless, he stood 
next in succession to that gentleman’s baronetcy and de- 
lightful place in Midlandshire. Not that he was, for a 
moment, inclined to dilate on his prospective good for- 
tune, or inform any one about it who might be reprehensibly 
ignorant of it already. To do so would have seemed to 
him contemptibly undignified. For the proudest pride of 
all is unquestionably that which takes its own grandeurs 
so absolutely for granted, that it holds it is altogether 
superfluous to call the attention of others to the fact of 
their existence. 

I have described the young man as graceful. Some 
enthusiastic souls were disposed to go much further, and 
pronounce him a miracle of refined good looks. As a 
boy, indeed, before his features had hardened and the 
bone of his face become so marked, with his golden-brown 


70 


The Wages of Sin. 


hair standing out like the aureole of some transfigured 
saint, Cyprian’s appearance had been exquisitely, almost 
absurdly, angelic. His hair was reduced to less celestial 
proportions now; while the beauty of his mouth was 
marred by an habitual compression of the lips, as of one 
upon whom the order of things wherein he is compelled 
to exist continually inflicts small shocks of disgust. 

Mr. Aldham affected a slight negligence in dress, wear- 
ing the inevitable broad-brimmed felt hat and clerical coat 
until the original black of them had grown greenish from 
long service. On the other hand, his linen was of the 
finest and whitest. He eschewed meat, eating only eggs 
or salt fish on a Friday. But the table-cloth must be 
spotless under the delicate china on which they were 
served ; while a wide-eyed, wondering Madonna of the 
modern pre-Raphaelite school gazed down from the wall 
at the sparely furnished table. All of which may sound 
over fastidious, finicking almost. Yet no one coming per- 
sonally in contact with Mr. Aldham would have ventured 
to apply the latter term to him, I think. For the young 
man’s delicate nature had an edge to it, and that a finely 
tempered one. It could cut. 

On the present occasion, as he paused surveying the 
gallery, his manner suddenly suffered a change. His light 
blue eyes lost their vaguely supercilious expression. A 
certain eagerness seemed to push up through his reserve. 

For just opposite, in the crowd gathered before the 
popular picture, he perceived a familiar figure — a young 
man like Saul the son of Kish, a head and shoulders 
above his fellows. Lancelot Crookenden's height, and 
make, the large serenity of his back, were quite unmis- 
takable. But Aldham was intimately acquainted with this 
young gentleman’s tastes ; for had he not, now about five 
years ago, at the earnest request of the boy’s guardian 
and his mother, turned 1 bear-leader,’ and gone round the 
world v *th him, in the interval which elapsed between his 
leaving Eton and going up to Cambridge ? Lancelot had 
got into no scrapes. Had caused very little anxiety or 
trouble ; save on the fine summer’s morning when he had 
walked off by himself from the hotel, and amused himself 
by swimming the Niagara river just below the rapids, 


Miss Mary Crookenden. 


7 1 


thereby giving his tutor-companion a very evil quarter of 
an hour. Through high and low latitudes alike, the boy 
had passed carrying his own sweet-tempered, unvexed and 
not superabundantly intelligent, British atmosphere along 
with him. He had regarded India as an awfully jolly 
place where you shot tigers, and stuck pigs, and played 
polo; and Canada as an even jollier place, because it 
wasn’t so fearfully hot, you know, where you had un- 
limited sleighing and skating, and where you could tramp 
any number of miles on snow-shoes after problematical 
big game. Had looked at all mountains principally with 
a view to climbing them ; at rivers with a view to fishing 
them ; at plains with a view to riding across them ; at 
forests with a view to hunting something in them ; at cities, 
however architecturally magnificent or historically in- 
teresting, principally with a view to leaving them ; at 
society, tempted all the world over to smile graciously upon 
so rich and kindly and well-favoured a youth, with a view, 
civilly but decidedly, to avoiding it as much as possible. 

Cyprian had really grown very fond of the boy ; but it 
was impossible to pretend that the note of culture was 
conspicuous in him. And it was, therefore, not without 
a movement of considerable curiosity that he crossed the 
room and addressed him now. 

‘ This is surprising,’ he said. ‘ You are one of the last 
persons I should have thought to find diligently studying 
pictures at half-past ten in the morning.’ 

* Oh ! I say, Aldham, how awfully fortunate to run 
across you like this. I didn’t know you’d come up yet. 
My mother was calling in Lancaster Gate the other day, 
and Lady Aldham told her you were coming for a night 
or two on your way through to Paris.’ 

Lancelot backed out of the crowd as he spoke, and 
stood in the vacant space before a large leather-covered 
settee. He beamed. There was really something very 
engaging about this young giant of four and twenty with 
the smooth sunburnt face, and quiet, candid eyes and 
brow. He had an admiration amounting almost to re- 
verence for his former travelling-companion ; and he made 
no attempt to disguise it. Lancelot was quite unaffected, 
undiplomatic, foolishly sincere. 


72 


The Wages of Sin . 


1 It's awfully fortunate/ he repeated — * I mean meeting 
you like this. And how's the dear old West Country 
looking ? ' 

1 The dear old West Country is looking extremely like 
an immense green sponge/ Aldham answered, smiling in 
his cool, thin way. 

The cordiality of the young man's greeting pleased him. 
Not only did it minister to his little conceit of himself ; 
but it tended to relieve his mind of a certain uncomfort- 
able suspicion which had proved somewhat troublesome 
to him during the last few months. 

* The rain has been incessant. My books were becom- 
ing mouldy. I was becoming rheumatic, so I hastened 
my journey by a few days. Moreover I wished to see 
the exhibitions before they closed. You are not here by 
yourself? ’ he added, after a moment’s pause. 

‘Yes, I am/ Lancelot replied. 

Mr. Aldham’s sense of pleasure was intensified. He even 
went so far as to be slightly annoyed with himself for 
having ever entertained the suspicion which had troubled 
him. He told himself he had always really known that 
suspicion to be absurd. 

1 What has brought you here all alone ? ' he asked, 
smiling again. ‘ Surely this is quite a new departure on 
your part. I thought you eschewed all artistic shows ; 
and had an uncivilized disposition to resolve pictures into 
their original elements — so many yards of canvas, so many 
shillingsworth of pigments, oil, turpentine, and other un- 
savourinesses.' 

Lancelot waited before answering — he was usually 
somewhat slow of speech- gazing down, meanwhile, at a 
long perspective of trouser, ending in white spatts, and 
the toes of a very neat pair of boots from Peels’. 

1 Well, I don’t care very much about pictures/ he said, 
at last. ‘ And that’s just the bother, you know. Other 
people do care for them, and I suppose I don’t like to 
find myself out of it.’ 

1 And so you are trying to find your way into it, so 
to speak, by means of a solitary tour of inspection this 
morning. That is a practical way of meeting a difficulty. 
Does the attempt seem likely to prove successful ? ’ 


Miss Mary Crookenden. 


n 


The young man shook his head gently in reply . — 1 I’m 
afraid I’m awfully dense, do you know, Aldham,’ he said. 
i I’ve never troubled myself much about pictures and 
things of that kind before, you see. They never seemed 
to matter much. But lately I’ve seemed to see it all in a 
different light. I — well, I’m afraid I’m a dolt.’ 

Lancelot contemplated his immaculate spatts once more. 
— 1 It’s an awful nuisance,’ he said quietly ; and there 
was a^singular ring of emotion in his voice. 

To Cyprian Aldham this outburst of confidence, this 
confession of ineptitude and inadequacy on the part of 
so conspicuously well-to-do a person appeared both 
amusing and pathetic. It was refreshingly naif. But it 
tended to reawaken those suspicions so recently laid to 
rest. He looked curiously at the goodly youth for a few 
seconds. He would have been glad to ask him one 
simple question. He could have put it in a very few 
words. But, happily, in the interests of patience and 
good manners, such simple questions are just the most 
impossible to ask ; and Mr. Aldham’s manners were above 
reproach. Therefore, he abstained from asking any ques- 
tion, and merely said, pleasantly yet with, perhaps, a faint 
flavour of patronage , — ‘ Believe me, you are very far from 
being a dolt. If you seriously wish to acquaint yourself 
with any matter, I do not think want of capacity will 
stand in your way.’ 

< Don’t you think so ? ’ Lancelot inquired. ‘ I’m awfully 
glad of that. I was beginning to be afraid I was only fit 
for a keeper, or a professional cricketer, or a bruiser, per- 
haps. Of course it doesn’t much matter what I am fit 
for. There are loads of fellows who’ve got plenty of 
brains, and if I'm not among them the loss is mine — 
that’s all. Only somehow it's made me rather low just 
lately. Of course it doesn’t really matter, only it’s nice 
to know you don’t think — oh ! well, please, Aldham, we 
won’t say any more about it. Look here, come and en- 
lighten me about these pictures. You understand all about 
them. They say this one’s awfully fine — u The Road to 
Ruin,” you know, by that new man everybody’s talking 
about.’ 

And Lancelot walked resolutely up to the little crowd 


74 


The Wages of Sin. 


again, and edged his way in, with a large gentleness, that 
was very irresistible morally as well as physically, till he 
stood right before the picture. 

Aldham followed in his wake, his curiosity by no means 
lessened, nor his fears allayed by this abrupt ending to 
the conversation. But once in front of the picture, his 
thoughts were directed into another channel. He was 
sensible of receiving a shock of surprise. The sad land- 
scape reminded him forcibly of outlying parts of his own 
parish of Beera Mills. The westerly wind, keen and salt 
off the Atlantic, seemed to cry, with impatient rustle, 
through those nipped, distorted oaks and beeches, and 
sweep away drearily over the waste beyond. Aldham 
was a little short-sighted. He bent forward to examine 
the two figures in the foreground with a sense of ex- 
pectation. He almost fancied he should recognise them 
as acquaintances. He looked at them long and carefully. 
He was not easily stirred; but the woman’s laughing, 
pleading, fearfully questioning face moved him strangely, 
although it proved unknown to him. 

* Ah ! this man Colthurst can paint,’ he exclaimed in- 
voluntarily, turning to Lancelot. 

* Yes, I know. At least, so everybody says.’ 

* This is fine,’ Aldham added ; 1 very fine, and remark- 
ably unpleasant.’ 

But the young man was not attending. An idea had 
suddenly occurred to him. 

1 1 say, doesn't it strike you that lane and the whole 
place is as like as two peas to the turn down to Slat 
Moor, on Withacott’s farm, you remember, before we had 
it drained and put up the new gates ? “ Road to Ruin,” I 

should just think it was, if the fellow expects to get a 
living out of that land. Poor old Jeffery found it so fast 
enough ; he died owing the best part of ten years’ rent. 
I’m glad to think there’s nothing as bad as that on the 
estate now. You might flush a woodcock down there, 
eh ! Aldham ; but there’s precious little else you'd get off 
that bit of country.’ 

Cyprian paused before answering. He had lately ex- 
pressed an encouraging opinion as to his former pupil’s 
abilities. But really he began to fear his encouragement 


Miss Mary Crookenden. 


1 5 


had been a trifle premature. The excellent youth must 
be amazingly innocent or lamentably superficial. 

* I am afraid it represents more than a question of 
farming/ he said. — The crowd had broken and passed 
for the moment, and the two very dissimilar young men 
stood alone before the popular picture. — 'I am afraid it 
represents the first act of a drama which no draining 
of land, putting up of new gates, remission of rents, or 
other mitigation of agricultural depression will prevent 
being recurrently played out, as long as there are men 
and women in this wicked world to play it.’ 

Lancelot looked hard at the speaker and then at the 
painting. 1 Oh ! I see.’ — He flushed through all his sun- 
burn . — 1 I’m glad Polly wouldn’t come this morning, after 
all/ he added in a low voice. 

The sharp edge of Mr. Aldham’s nature showed itself, 
just then, in the glance he turned upon the young man 
beside him. 1 Miss Crookenden he began. But Lance- 

lot did not, or would not hear him. 

1 They say it’s sold for a cool thousand/ he remarked. 

Aldham was annoyed. It had never occurred to him 
before that this boy would venture to do anything so very 
like snubbing him. Then, moreover, he began to fear his 
suspicions were justified, that they were most provokingly 
far away from an absurdity. Involuntarily he indulged 
in one of those rather worldly calculations, which the 
mind carries through so rapidly, that the conscience has 
not time to protest against them before they are an ac- 
complished fact. Instinctively he set the sober dignities 
of Aldham Revel against the Slerracombe property ; the 
long pedigree of the fine, old, Midlandshire family, against 
the few generations of that of the Bristol merchant. He 
discounted the advantages of the Combmartin connection 
by certain by no means aristocratically despicable cousin- 
ships on his own mother's side. Finally he weighed his 
attainments, his scholarship, and knowledge of the world, 
against the modest acquirements of the handsome, simple, 
young Dives standing by him. Before conscience could 
intervene with a comment on the slight unworthiness of 
this proceeding, the calculation was not only made, but 
the satisfaction flowing from it was already comforting 


76 


The Wages of Sin. 


and appeasing Cyprian Aldham. The sharp edge of his 
nature was sheathed within the scabbard of his delicate 
manner again. For no doubt remained in his mind which 
scale, in this little process of weighing, kicked the beam. 

1 A thousand ? Hardly such a sum as that, I imagine/ 
he said suavely, in response to Lancelot’s last remark. 

‘ Halve it and you will probably be much nearer the mark.’ 
— Aldham turned over the leaves of his catalogue rather 
absently . — * I am glad to have seen it/ he continued. 1 1 
was curious to arrive at conclusions regarding it for my- 
self, after reading the widely divergent criticisms it has 
called forth. And I see it is very remarkable. Whether 
you like the spirit of it or not the picture is undeniably a 
great one.' 

*1 suppose it is/ Lancelot rejoined, the flush still re- 
maining on his smooth skin. 1 But I don’t like it. I tell 
you what, Aldham, if it means all you say it does, it 
seems to me most awkwardly like selling a woman’s 
honour. Any fellow who could spend months — I suppose 
it takes months — in painting such a thing, thinking about 
it all the while, knowing all he meant by it, and then go 
and take money for it, must be awfully cold-blooded. I 
hope I shan’t run across this Mr. Colthurst. I shouldn’t 
care to have to shake hands with him.’ 

By common consent the two men sauntered on, making 
place for another batch of spectators. 

1 If it means all that/ Lancelot repeated, { he must be a 
blackguard, to my thinking, or a brute.’ 

Why is it that the virtues of our friends, specially 
when those friends are our juniors, do not invariably give 
us unmixed joy ? Cyprian Aldham was a high-minded 
and pure-lived man, he was moreover, by profession, a 
preacher of righteousness ; yet instead of hailing the 
righteousness of this ardent young moralist enthusiasti- 
cally, and patting it, in cordial admiration, upon the back, 
he was irritated by it. It appeared to him rather exces- 
sive, out of place. His smile was decidedly chilly and 
his tone of patronage marked, as he said : — 

1 Really I cannot admit poor Mr. Colthurst’s brutality 
follows as a matter of course. Yours is a very destruc- 
tive line of criticism. If it is the true one we should be 


Miss Mary Crookenden. 


77 


compelled to rule out some of the finest works of literature 
and art. But I think you probably hardly realize how 
much you demand that we should part with in our respect 
for womanhood in the abstract, Lancelot. This is a 
question which cannot be settled off-hand and in obedience 
of personal feeling. Fundamentally your demand may be 
a noble one. But a free response to it must unquestion- 
ably leave us poorer by the loss of much which is not 
only of high esthetic interest and value, but of high moral 
value likewise.' 

‘ 1 don’t pretend to know anything about that,’ Lancelot 
said quietly, standing very large, hot, and stiff, in the 
middle of the room. ‘ All I know is if you’ve ever cared 
for one woman, it makes you care about what you call 
womanhood in the abstract too, somehow. A wrong done, 
or going to be done, to any woman, seems, in a way, 
like a wrong to her — and — and — well, you want to gc 
and punch the brute's head who’s done it — that’s all.’ 

Aldham looked curiously at the young man. He laughed 
a little, presumably at the grammar which, in the struggle 
to express his thoughts poor Lancelot had let go so very 
far astray. 

‘You take the matter with a really embarrassing de- 
gree of seriousness,’ he said. ‘You are a critic armed 
with a bludgeon. I am very far from underrating the 
moral question involved ; but I think your chivalry makes 
you exaggerate the offence of the artist to an unwarrant- 
able extent.’ 

‘ Well, I don't like it. I didn’t like that other picture, 
in the first room, you know, by this man Colthurst — “ The 
Evening of Labour.” But this settles it. Let's look at 
something else, please. What awfully queer things people 
do seem to admire.' 

Half an hour later, as they passed the turnstile, and 
passed down the matted stairs to the entrance, Lancelot 
referred to the picture again. It appeared to have taken 
singular hold on his imagination. 

‘ I wish that landscape wasn’t so like Slat Moor. Colt- 
hurst ’ — he repeated — ‘ Colthurst, I’m sure I’ve heard the 
name somewhere. Not lately, I don’t mean. It’s in 
everybody’s mouth now. But long ago— and I can’t for 


78 


The Wages of Sin. 


the life of me remember what I associate it with ! I say, 
Aldham, you’ll come back to luncheon, won’t you ? My 
mother’s always only too delighted to see you, you know.’ 


Chapter III. 

Mr. Aldham accepted the invitation to luncheon. As 
to food, it was an admirable luncheon. But our young 
clergyman was laudably indifferent to what are euphe- 
mistically known as the pleasures of the table. And 
otherwise the luncheon was a distinctly dull one. Pass- 
ing years had not lessened Mrs. Crookenden’s tribal 
egotism, weakened her little prejudices, or increased her 
limited gift of sympathy. Her two daughters, Adela and 
Carrie, who had now exchanged the schoolroom and 
brown holland frocks for a well-grown and buxom young 
womanhood, were not distinguished for sustained power 
or variety of topics in conversation. They were estimable 
girls, but both their minds and bodies moved slowly. 
They had excellent digestions. They were very indus- 
trious. They did an immense amount of needlework. 
They subscribed to a couple of well-known circulating 
libraries, and read an immense number of books. By the 
needlework the poor of Slerracombe and of a certain 
London parish did profit appreciably. By the books they 
did not themselves, however, profit in any appreciable 
degree. They never skipped. They read each and every 
book through from beginning to end. Then, and then 
only, they felt that they could conscientiously state that 
they had read it. And the making of this statement, it 
would appear, constituted the sole incentive to and aim 
of all their reading. It never occurred to them that 
literature and life have any connection — anything in com- 
mon ; equally it never occurred to them to suspect a 
certain futility in their studies. They were perfectly 
satisfied. It followed, not unnaturally, that Slerracombe 
House had the reputation, in some quarters, of being a 
dull house. When the family moved up to London, the 
dulness went too, and spread itself over the residence in 


Miss Mary Crookenden . 


79 


Grosvenor Crescent, or Bryanston Square, or Brook 
Street, or anywhere else that Mrs. Crookenden had taken 
for the season. It was a serene, placid, well-bred dul- 
ness ; an unexceptionably respectable manifestation of the 
presence of the great Goddess, so dear to the British mind 
and heart. But there, in the midst of them, the great 
Goddess did unquestionably and persistently sit enthroned. 

And Aldham, I am afraid, did not do much on the pre- 
sent occasion to disturb the local atmosphere with any 
little breezes of liveliness, or lightning flashes of wit. He 
was preoccupied. He would have given a good deal for 
ten minutes alone with his hostess, for he possessed a 
gift of diplomacy with women. From them he could 
usually extract information if he really wanted to do so, 
without compromising himself or showing his hand. 
Cyprian had a rather elaborate theory as to the charac- 
teristics of the ideal priest. Among these he certainly 
classed the wisdom of the serpent as well as the harm- 
lessness of the dove — a fine astuteness combined with 
a serene inscrutability. It gave him much subjective 
pleasure to make play both with his astuteness and his 
inscrutability. But in the present case neither of these 
qualities had much chance of giving outward and visible 
sign of their existence. The two Miss Crookendens and 
their needlework remained constantly in waiting upon 
their mother. And this triumvirate of large, sleek, silent, 
amiable women was quite too much for the young clergy- 
man. He might as well have attempted to diplomatize 
with, and extract information from, a trio of well-con- 
ditioned Cheshire cheeses, or other inanimate solid bodies 
of noble proportions. 

So he left soon after luncheon, and took his way back 
through the bright, steaming streets — the sun had come 
out after a heavy thunder shower — to his aunt, Miss 
Harriet Aldham's comfortable house in Eccleston Square. 
He was unden : ably perturbed in spirit. For the impression 
he had received during the course of the morning, made 
a very positive difference in his outlook. And this 
difference was not in the direction of increased personal 
happiness. Aldham was a religious man. He believed 
in the elevating effect of discipline, in the ennobling effect 


8o 


The Wages of Sin. 


of trial. He held that the thwarting of earthly joy will 
eventually, if received with due submission, lead to an 
increase of the joy which is eternal. But his assent to 
these high doctrines was more the result of circumstance 
than of experience. And then, moreover, at two and thirty 
instinct and desire are inconveniently strong, even in 
devout-minded and highly-cultivated persons. And in- 
stinct and desire are rank materialists, who have a dis- 
position to look very suspiciously on the substitution of 
prospective and transcendental for immediate and mun- 
dane satisfactions. Mr. Aldham's lips were a good deal 
compressed and his expression was decidedly severe as 
he passed through the hall of the house in Eccleston 
Square. 

The dining-room door stood open, and within he caught 
sight of the unmistakable form of Mary Crookenden’ s old 
Mulatto nurse, and heard her broken, guttural tones 
mingling queerly with the staccato of Mrs. Gregory, his 
aunt's invaluable housekeeper. Mrs. Chloe had remained 
faithful to some of the customs of the far-away southern 
plantation on which her youth had been passed. Even 
in the height of the London season she stoutly refused 
other headgear than a crimson and gold silk handkerchief, 
twisted into a turban-like cap over her tight-curling, grey 
hair. As this dab of gay colour caught the young man's 
eye he was aware of a curious leap of his pulse, which had 
nothing in the world to do either with things diplomatic 
or things eternal and transcendental. It annoyed him, 
and yet, dear me, how delicious it was ! He ran upstairs. 
And then, irritated at his own impetuosity and the 
character of the emotion that generated it, he waited a 
few seconds on the landing, before entering the drawing- 
room. 

The scene presented to him was a graceful one. Mary 
Crookenden had just risen to go. She stood in the arch- 
way connecting the two light-coloured, fresh-looking 
rooms. Her hand rested in that of the pretty, little, old 
lady her hostess, and as she looked down at the latter 
there was a soft, shining brightness in her lovely eyes. 
Miss Crookenden dressed extremely well in these days — 
almost unnecessarily well, her aunt Caroline thought. Yet 


Miss Mary Crookenden. 


81 


that lady, with the best will in the world — best though 
unconscious — to pick holes, found it impossible to prefer 
her old charge of vulgarity against her niece's appearance. 
Miss Crookenden carefully eschewed what was startling. 
A genre tapageur was by no means to her taste. But she 
liked to be exquisite. And after all, why should not a 
young lady of fortune, with no very serious duties to 
engage her attention, apply her mind to being exquisite ? 
Nature had given her a pretty broad hint in that direction 
by endowing her with so charming a face and figure. She 
merely took the hint. That was all. 

On the present occasion she was arrayed in a dress of 
the palest and softest blue and white muslin — an elaborate 
construction of flounces and draperies, diversified by lace 
and ingenious loops and knots of ribbon. Her hat was 
adorned with more loops and knots, as was the top of 
her lace parasol. The dressmaker who had confected this 
diaphanous costume must have been a true artist in her 
way. The highest art, we know, reproduces the effect 
of nature, on the principle of the meeting of extremes. She 
had, apparently, pressed summer clouds into her service, 
and had cut yards off the blue sky, where it grows frail 
against the horizon, to produce suitable clothing for her 
customer. Miss Crookenden’s appearance, indeed, was 
altogether ethereal, for she belonged to that rare type of 
fair women who — if the poor little adjective had not been 
so hard-worked of late years that one fights rather shy of 
using it — are best described as dusky blondes. Her hair 
had the shaded brightness about it which the French call 
blond cendre. Her eyebrows and eyelashes were dark; 
while her skin was of the peculiar warm, waxen whiteness 
you see in the petals of some flowers, notably in fresh 
magnolia blossoms. If Kent Crookenden prophesied that 
his little niece would grow into a remarkably pretty per- 
son, his prophecy had found generous fulfilment. 

At eighteen, upon the death of her father, the young 
girl had practically become her own mistress. Her uncle, 
it is true, exercised nominal authority over her. But the 
Rector was not a stern disciplinarian, particularly where 
Mary was concerned. And Madame Jacobini — who has 
already been mentioned as a distant cousin of the 

G 


82 


The Wages of Sin. 


Crookendens, more distinguished for the romantic aspects 
of her marriage than its social and material advantages 
— who for some years had acted as companion to her 
young kinswoman, found it undesirable, sweet though the 
girl’s nature was, to hold her with a tight rein. 

Mary had a good two thousand a year. She had an ex- 
tremely decorative little house in St. George’s Road, the 
front of it painted pale blue at this period. She had a 
certain originality of speech and manner that marked her 
out definitely from most of the young girls about her, 
and a gift for drawing and painting which raised her per- 
formances considerably above those of the average 
amateur. In short, Miss Crookenden had a position and 
a reputation. Perhaps she was disposed to reckon both 
more highly than they deserved. Many of us are inclined 
to fall into the mistake of measuring our importance, not 
by the magnitude of our attainments, so much as by the 
limited area of the stage on which they are displayed. 
Mary Crookenden was queen of a small country. And 
I fear that the fact of her royal prerogative, rather than 
narrow boundaries of her dominions, was oftenest present 
to her thoughts. But on the present occasion it was 
certainly Miss Crookenden’s obvious excellencies, not her 
possible defects, which impressed Cyprian Aldham as she 
greeted him smilingly. 

* You are here at last,' she said. * We have been sitting 
on the edges of our chairs for a good half-hour expecting 
you.’ 

'Yes, dear child, I am afraid I have delayed her,’ broke 
in Miss Harriet, in her little, coaxing, explanatory manner. 

' She is on her way to some great afternoon party, but 
I begged her to wait. I so wanted you just to see 
her.’ 

Miss Aldham had been pretty at seventeen, she was still 
very pretty at over seventy, as she stood holding the 
young girl’s hand caressingly and looking up with timid, 
short-sighted eyes, at the tall young clergyman. She 
idolised her nephew. Nothing, in her opinion, could 
possibly be too good for him ; and his presence filled not 
only her gentle breast, but her sweet, faded countenance 
with a sort of tremulous rapture. 


Miss Mary Crookenden. 


83 


'Am I such a very fine sight, then, dear Miss Har- 
riet ? ’ Mary Crookenden asked, gaily. 

'You are one of the sights 1 love best to see/ the old 
lady answered. 

The grave, full tones of Miss Crookenden’s voice gave 
a remarkable touch of dignity to her most playful, and 
even daring little speeches. She was, indeed, a rather 
confusing young lady to deal with. Her small audacities 
sometimes tempted the unwary to make advances which 
they subsequently had cause to regret. It was unwise to 
take too great advantage of Miss Crookenden’s gracious- 
ness. You frequently got a snub for your pains. Cyprian 
Aldham was by no means given to indiscreet advances, 
so he fared very well, as a rule, at the young lady's hands. 
She turned to him now with that soft shining still in her 
eyes. And it must be conceded that he found her abso- 
lutely enchanting. 

' You are to be congratulated/ she said. 'You are very 
fortunate. You certainly possess the most delightful aunt 
in the world.’ 

Aldham bowed — ' I know it/ he replied. 

r My dear, my dear/ remonstrated the old lady, gently, — 
'you both think much too highly of me. It is very kind of 
you ; but I have never been considered at all a clever person.’ 

' Clever ! why you have the most charming cleverness 
that exists/ Mary said — ' the cleverness of making one 
feel as good as gold, pleased with oneself and everybody 
else. I was very cross when I came here. I was annoyed 
at having to go to Lady Combmartin’s. I thought she 
had been impertinent, and I intended to tell her so. She 
has asked me and has not asked Madame Jacobini, 
and ’ 

' My dear, you are not going alone.’ — Miss Harriet 
interposed this assertion or inquiry — it partook of the 
nature of both — in tones of modest horror. The habits 
of modern young women were as incomprehensible as 
they were alarming to her. 

' Oh ! no, Chloe will take me there. And Lancelot 
promised to look out for me, and place me in safety 
under Aunt Caroline’s wing. Aunt Caroline’s wing is the 
most unexceptionably correct of wings, you know.' 

G 2 


8 4 


The Wages of Sin. 


4 Then, my dear, you ought to go. I ought not to keep 
you any longer. Mr. Crookenden will get tired of waiting.' 

Mary looked down at her hostess’ hand as it lay in 
hers encased in a fine, open-work, silk mitten, and stroked 
it tenderly. 

4 Yes, I ought to go,’ she answered. 4 Lancelot is ad- 
mirably patient. He has never got tired of waiting yet, 
and this is by no means the first time I have kept him 
waiting. But it is hardly fair, is it, to trade upon his 
virtues ? ’ 

‘And Lancelot’s patience has had a rather heavy strain 
put upon it to-day, already,’ Cyprian Aldham remarked. 
— He spoke with a slight constraint, not quite naturally 
or easily. 

4 Oh ! he went to the Academy, after all, then ; and 
you met him there ? Poor dear Lance, I wonder what he 
thought of it all ! ’ 

4 His criticisms were original ; but they were very much 
to his credit from the ethical point of view,’ Aldham said, 
rather incisively. 

4 Oh ! they are safe to be that,’ the girl rejoined, lightly. 
Then she bent her pretty head and kissed her hostess. 

4 Good-bye, dear Miss Harriet,’ she went on. 4 I really 
ought to go. It is a great pity. I would so much rather 
stay here with you, and hear about Lance in his character 
of art-critic. And then I wanted to hear something 
about Uncle Kent too. He doesn’t write very often. 
Have you seen him lately, Mr. Aldham ? Do you know if 
he means to come up to London before we all go abroad ? 
How I wish he could be persuaded to go with us.’ 

Cyprian replied that he had been at Brattleworthy at 
the end of the previous week, and that the Rector had 
expressed no intention of coming to London. In fact 
a journey of any description seemed as remote from his 
thoughts as could well be. 

4 He had just got some fresh books on his favourite sub- 
ject of primitive marriage. He informed me that the} 
contained many new and interesting facts. I do not think 
there is any prospect of his leaving home at present.’ 

Miss Crookenden’s face clouded slightly . — 4 He sticks at 
Brattleworthy in the most hopeless way now,’ she said. 


Miss Mary Crookenden. 


85 


‘ And Pm sure it cannot be good for him. He tells me 
he cannot afford holidays — why, I can’t imagine. He says 
he has had no losses, and I have always understood 
he was very well off. But he seems to have developed 
a perfect mania for economy and retrenchment. You 
must have observed it ? It makes me quite wretched/ 

‘You do not care about economy ? ’ observed Cyprian, 
quickly. 

Miss Crookenden smiled very prettily . — 1 No, I don’t 
care much about it, Pm afraid. I believe I am a terrible 
spendthrift.' 

' My dear, pray do not call yourself by such distressing 
names,’ pleaded Miss Harriet, gently. 

‘ Oh ! I don’t call myself a spendthrift. I call myself 
generous, indifferent to base considerations of pounds, 
shillings, and pence ; superior to the love of money which 
is the root of all evil, anything and everything the reverse 
of that most objectionable thing named stingy,’ the girl 
answered, brightly. ‘ It is dear Sara Jacobini who calls 
me a spendthrift.’ 

‘ And your uncle,’ suggested Aldham. 

1 No, there you do him an injustice,’ she answered, 
gravely. ‘ Uncle Kent is only — well — near, where he him- 
self is concerned. He assures me he never realized how 
interesting life could be till he became a miser. A miser ! 
— it makes me miserable, but, really, absurd as it seems, 
that is the only word. I believe soon he will deny him- 
self the actual necessaries of life.’ 

Several passages in the above conversation had proved 
anything but reassuring to Mr. Aldham. He spoke now 
with his habitual courtesy of demeanour but with a slight 
lapse in his habitual taste and tact. 

* I do not think you need be seriously anxious on that 
point, Miss Crookenden. I had the pleasure of dining 
with your uncle about a fortnight ago, and I did not ob- 
serve any tendency to asceticism which could be described 
as dangerous. There were no signs of positive want.’ 

Mary opened her beautiful eyes rather wide, and fixed 
them on the speaker. She appeared surprised. 

* Please, understand,’ she said, 1 that if you have the 
most delightful aunt in the world, I, in my opinion, ar- 


86 


The Wages of Sin. 


the happy owner of quite the most delightful uncle/ — 
Turnnig to the old lady, she added, softly: — *He spoils 
me, Miss Harriet. Ever since I can remember he has 
petted, and indulged, and spoilt me. And, dear me, it is 
very, very nice to be spoilt/ 

1 It would not be very easy to spoil you, my dear, I 
think/ Miss Aldham put in, perhaps rather inconsequently. 
She was anxious that these young people should part on 
the best terms possible, and she was vaguely sensible that 
the conversation had turned a trifle sour, somehow. 

1 Wouldn’t it ? I wish I thought that/ Mary said, her 
tone changing. * But I really must go. Think of poor 
Lance, all this time, waiting on the outskirts of a crowd of 
footmen ! Think of the annihilating composure with which 
Aunt Caroline will receive me, and proceed to point out 
that, as usual, I am dreadfully late. Au revoir y dear Miss 
Harriet. You help in the spoiling. I shall come back 
again in a day or two for another dose/ 

And with that, Mary Crookenden, in her vaporous blue 
and white flounces and ribbons, swept away downstairs 
and into the guardianship of the watchful and devoted 
Mrs. Chloe, followed by Cyprian Aldham as far as the 
front door. 

The pretty old lady, meanwhile, sat down on one of 
the pale chintz-covered sofas upstairs, and smoothed 
down the lap of her grey satin dress with a quick move- 
ment of the hands as of some sweet, quakerish, little bird 
preening its feathers. 

‘ Dearest Cyprian/ she said, * he loves her, and no 
wonder. She is a lovely creature. And she will love 
him too. How can she help it ? I wish he would speak ? 
Perhaps he thinks he is not well enough off to propose 
to her — dear child, calling herself a spendthrift 1 But I 
think I can rectify that ; I must tell him — though it makes 
me a little nervous — he can have all he wants/ 

She smoothed down her grey satin lap again. *Ah ! 
please God/ she went on, 1 1 may live to see it ! Precious 
boy. — Then I could indeed say my Nunc Dimittis cheerfully/ 

Does desire ever fail ? I think not ; whatever, accord- 
ing to the revisers of the Old Testament, may happen to 
its alternative, the caperberry. 


Miss Mary Crookenden. 


8 7 


Chapter IV. 

The famous conductor raises his baton — two beats — and 
then from the red and yellow band-stand, on the left, the 
first notes of the polished, courtly introduction to Weber’s 
1 1 nvitation a la valse ’ sweep out on the evening air. 

1 Ah, what a relief ! After the drench of Wagnerian 
discords I endured during three mortal hours last night 
to please you, Mary, this comes like a return of the golden 
age.’ 

The speaker, a lady of middle-age, leaned her shoulder 
against one of the iron pillars of the wide open gallery 
running along the front of the great conservatories, and 
beat out the time of the air on the top of the balustrade 
with thin nervous fingers on which sparkled a rather 
superfluous number of rings. She was frankly ugly. 
Her brown skin was parchment-like and wrinkled. Her 
forehead was crossed by many hard lines. There were 
hard lines, too, about her large mouth. Her grey hair, 
frizzed thickly in front, looked harsh against her dark 
face. Her eyes were brown, and at this moment extremely 
bright, as she moved her head to and fro in sympathy 
with the music, and stared, with the assurance of a 
person who is accustomed to publicity and perfectly 
secure of herself, at the slowly circulating crowd and 
the rows of people sitting on the terrace below. I 
have described this lady as frankly ugly, yet those who 
saw her for the first time generally received an im- 
pression of a far from plain woman. For there was an 
extraordinary mobility in her expression, her face was 
so vivacious and clever, her self-assurance imposed so 
upon the observer’s imagination, that I have often — even 
after an acquaintance of long standing — found myself 
watching Madame Jacobini with as much interest as though 
she had been a well-accredited beauty. 

The year of which we are speaking was among the 
first of those in which the British public, distinguishing 
itself by the discovery that it is more agreeable to be 
out of doors than indoors on a hot midsummer evening, 
proceeded, under the plea of improving its mind by studies, 


88 


The Wages of Sin. 


inventive, hygienic, piscatorial or imperial, to spend some 
hours nightly in the gardens that occupied the space be- 
tween the back of the Exhibition buildings and the con- 
servatories of the Royal Horticultural Society. No doubt 
they do these things better in France. The English nature, 
even in moments of legitimate frivolity, commits itself with 
a certain reserve to its amusements. Yet, although the 
press of human figures occupying the large stage were, 
as Madame Jacobini allowed, somewhat lacking in super- 
ficial gaiety and animation, the general effect was a brilliant 
one. 

The gardens appeared vast and fantastic as some scene 
from the Arabian Nights under the lines of softly tinted 
lanterns festooned from tree to tree. Each grass plat was 
edged by tiny globes of jewelled light. The shrubs broke 
into strange blossoming of rosy lamps which were doubled 
by reflections in the gleaming surface of water. The air 
was thick with the sound of music; the monotonous hum 
of hundreds of quiet English voices ; the stir of hundreds 
of well-set English footsteps pacing the central terrace and 
all the diverging alleys and wide stone stairways; with 
the splash and tinkle of fountains falling in broken rain- 
bows of amber, ruby, or lambent green; and with the 
hoarse roar, like the ceaseless urgent beat of some tideless 
sea, of all London stretching away for miles outside, north, 
south, and east and west. While high in mid-air, in 
singular contrast to the fairy-like space of rich conflicting 
colour, of strangely tinted foliage, and shifting human 
figures below, the cold merciless stare of the electric light — 
harsh and untempered as the spirit of modern science to 
which it owes its birth — showed dazzling against the 
sombre curtain of the sky, and called into hard relief the 
roofs and parapets of the neighbouring buildings. 

1 How any one in their senses,’ continued Madame 
Jacobini, 1 can find relaxation or inspiration in listening to 
music that is a cross between an acrostic, a sermon, and 
a problem in the higher mathematics, with spectacular 
incidents tacked on to it worthy only of a second-rate 
pantomime, 1 own I do not understand. Of course I 
know it may be said Weber paved the way. He was an 
innovator, and had the abominably bad taste to be born 


Miss Mary Crookenden. 


a German too. But nothing will persuade me he would 
not have held his ears and cried “ Enough ” before the 
end of the first act of any one of Wagner’s operas. Tee- 
tee, tum-tee, tee-tee, tum-tee — ah ! ah ! — delicious, ravish- 
ing,’ she exclaimed, as the subtle melody swept on. 

‘ Listen to that enchanting lift and then the drop ! It 
gathers up all the happy and all the desperate things 
that have ever happened in a ball-room. Dear me, the 
man who conceived that must have been something of a 
wizard ! ’ 

‘ Signor Jacobini was a disciple of Weber’s ? ’ inquired * 
Mary Crookenden. 

The girl sat well back in the chair, which she had 
dragged out of the rank, and turned round facing the front 
of the open gallery. There was a repose, a pretty indo- 
lence in her attitude, which formed a marked contrast to 
the vivacity of her companion. 

‘Jacobini, poor dear creature, was unfortunately obsti- 
nately and exclusively his own disciple,’ returned the 
latter. ‘ Otherwise I should now, I suppose, be drawing 
a comfortable income from the royalties on his sixteen 
operas. Dear, execrable little operas ! — You never heard 
one of them performed, Mary ? ' 

Miss Crookenden shook her head in smiling silence. 

‘No, of course you never did. They all died of neglect 
or inanition with fearful rapidity. Yet there were some 
charming airs in them. Did I tell you I heard an air from 
one of them — “The Silesian Lover” — ground out on a 
very, very old organ in St. George’s Road the other day ? 

It met me like a ghost at the street corner, that poor little 
tune. In a moment of sentiment I gave the rascally 
Italian organ-grinder five shillings.’ 

‘ That was an error of judgment, Sara,’ the young lady 
remarked. — Madame Jacobini, it may be stated in passing, 
requested that her Christian name might always be pro- 
nounced in the Italian manner and written without the 
final h. — ‘ He will go in the strength of that five shillings 
up and down St. George’s Road for many days. And, 
you know you hate an organ.’ 

Madame Jacobini huddled her velvet and fur mantle 
closer about her thin shoulders — she was one of those 


90 


The Wages of Sin. 


persons who are preternaturally sensitive to cold — with 
a little grimace and quick, half humorous, half melancholy 
smile, as she let her eyes linger on the long perspective 
of swaying lanterns. 

1 Oh ! ' she exclaimed, 1 the poor silly superannuated 
little tune made me feel young again — for three minutes, 
at least. So it was cheap, uncommonly cheap, my dear, 
at five shillings.’ 

4 Forgive me — I was stupid/ Miss Crookenden said. 4 1 
ought not to have said that ; it was very thoughtless.’ 

Madame Jacobini turned to the girl, contemplated the 
charming upturned face, and then answered, laughing 
quietly: — ‘You will readily be forgiven greater sins than 
this, Mary, I fancy, if you only beg pardon for them 
looking as you look now.’ 

Miss Crookenden sank back in her chair. It was not 
easy to say how far she relished such outspoken allusions 
to her beauty. The aspects of her character were, as 
we have said, contradictory. And if she had moments of 
audacity, in which she indulged in rather unconventional 
breadth of speech and action, she had also moments of 
proud modesty, in which she shrank, with an instinctive 
movement of self-protection, from compliments which 
most pretty women can swallow without any winking. 
Outwardly this young lady was remarkably finished and 
mature. Inwardly, in mind and heart, she was delightfully 
vague and inexperienced. I say delightfully, and yet it 
must be admitted that the results of this inexperience 
often proved inconvenient both to herself and others. Miss 
Crookenden refused to see what was unlovely, to admit the 
existence of what was impure. If she needs must touch 
pitch, she would whitewash her pitch first, believing 
thereby to escape defilement. Many of the sweetest and 
noblest women go through life practising these pious 
frauds upon themselves. It is impossible not to honour 
them. Yet fraud, even of this high-minded description, 
remains fraud still and brings its inevitable punishment 
along with it. 

Madame Jacobini’ s experience of life, on the other hand, 
had been pretty mixed. With a high standard of personal 
conduct she combined a large toleration for the follies and 


Miss Mary Crookenden. 


91 


frailty of her fellow-creatures. She had known dear good 
people often do that which was very much the reverse 
of dear or good. She continued to hope all things, being 
a generous-natured woman. But she had learned to ex- 
pect little. She was not easily surprised, easily shocked. 
Consequently it was alarming to her to watch Mary 
Crookenden — to note the girl’s refusal to be enlightened 
regarding the seamy side of life. Madame Jacobini was 
often at a loss how to act for the best in this matter. 
She saw that her young charge had a disconcerting ten- 
dency to walk very near the edge of small social pre- 
cipices without at all measuring the inconveniences of 
that style of promenade. Should she call out and warn 
her in plain English ? Should she remain silent ? Inno- 
cence, in pictures, is represented as guarded by strong 
detachments of ever-watchful angels. But Madame Jaco- 
bini’s faith in the vigilance of these celestial guardians 
was a trifle shaky. The story of Una and the lion, though 
vastly pretty and encouraging, is, she had reason to 
fear, apocryphal. Yet to rub the bloom of guilelessness 
off the girl’s mind was an odious and ungrateful task. 
The elder woman shrank from it in honest disgust ; and 
ended by contenting herself with throwing out pretty broad 
hints, which she trusted her young friend might profit by. 
Hints that, as a rule I fear, rather offended the taste 
than illumined the social understanding of that wilfully, 
and in a sense, beautifully blind maiden. 

It was probably in furtherance of this project — a mild 
casting out of devils by Beelzebub — that after a while 
Madame Jacobini spoke again. She had been gazing 
about her in her usual frank, unapologetic manner, con- 
sidering the crowd, which grew denser upon the terrace 
below, and the passers-by in the gallery. She was naturally 
gregarious. The unreal theatrical aspect of the scene 
appealed to her strongly. Her sense of drama was keen 
— keen to the point of sometimes perceiving drama where 
it can hardly be said to have existed. 

' There is your Russian again, Mary/ she remarked. 
' He has just posted himself by the conservatory entrance. 
This is not so good a place for staring as the opera ; and 
owing to your position he can only behold your hat. But 


92 


The Wages of Sin. 


he commands a fine uninterrupted view of me. Je ne sais 
pas la rose , mais fai vecu pres d'elle y so let us hope he 
derives a measure of satisfaction from looking at me.’ 

* He is not a Russian/ Miss Crookenden said. * I was 
sure of that last night. He is as English as we are 
ourselves. 1 

1 Oh ! well that is not saying very much. You, my 

dear, are half American. And I , well by marriage, 

and adoption, and tastes, and so on, I belong to half the 
nations of Europe/ 

1 A mongrel, in fact/ observed Mary, very gently. 

' Precisely, and that is why your dear aunt, Mrs. 
Crookenden, detests me so cordially.’ — Madame Jacobini 
made a distinctly wicked grimace this time. 

' That reminds me/ Mary said, being rather anxious to 
change the conversation, ‘ I found out about Aunt Caro- 
line’s movements. She leads forth the Chosen People 

‘ Don’t be profane/ put in Madame Jacobini. 

' But they are chosen, most carefully chosen. — The two 
girls, of course ; Lady Dorothy ; Lance, if he can be 
caught; Lady Alicia and Mr. Winteibotham and Violet, 
— they can be caught without any difficulty at all, — and 
she leads them forth, as I was going to tell you, on 
Thursday, via Paris, Pontarlier, and Lausanne.’ 

1 Then we ’ began Madame Jacobini. 

' Representing the mixed multitude that followed them 
out of Egypt, Sara ? ’ 

1 We will go on Friday ’ 

i Friday is a very unlucky day for a journey/ remarked 
Miss Crookenden. 

'Not so unlucky as a Thursday, when it would neces- 
sitate travelling with your aunt. We will go on Friday, 
by Calais, Laon, and Berne. Which way and when does 
Mr. Aldham go ? ’ 

' I don’t know.’ — There was a silence. 

' Dear me, 1 wish something would happen/ Mary re- 
marked presently. ' I wonder why they don’t come — 
Adolphus Carr and Mr. Aldham, I mean. They ought to 
be here by this time. Can't you see them, Sara ? Lance 
is generally pretty obvious.’ 

* I see no one but the Russian/ replied Madame Jacobini, 


Miss Mary Crookenden. 


93 

returning rather maliciously to the charge. ‘ His eyes are 
oblique, and his moustache grows up away from his lip — 
you know how I mean, and he has the figure of a bear. 
He is a Russian from the south-eastern provinces, with 
a strong dash of Tartar blood. I am never mistaken in 
a nationality/ 

1 His clothes are English. At least they were last 
night/ 

( Clothes !' cried Madame Jacobini, contemptuously. 
' They prove nothing. In these days we are the tailors of 
the universe. He is a Russian, I tell you, a Socialist, a 
Nihilist, something tremendous, and' — she paused a 
moment, — ‘he is distractedly anxious to have another 
look at you/ 

‘ I wish they would come/ Miss Crookenden repeated. 
She got up from her chair with much indolent grace, and 
rested her hands on the iron balustrade. ‘I wonder I 
don't see Lancelot. I told him where to meet us/ 

She stood for a minute or two scanning the gardens 
below, and then turning round, glanced slowly up and 
down the gallery. She sat down suddenly again, her 
charming face wearing an expression of active annoyance. 
— ‘ How extremely unpleasant ! ' she exclaimed. ‘ Your 
Russian was staring this way/ 

‘ He usually is staring this way/ put in the other lady, 
parenthetically. 

‘ But I had no notion he was so near. I found myself 
looking him full in the face/ 

‘ Dear, dear, what a cruel misfortune — specially for him, 
poor man/ cried Madame Jacobini, putting up both hands 
and eyebrows. 

‘ As I told you, he is an Englishman/ the girl continued, 
rather loftily ignoring the interruption. ‘And now I re- 
member him perfectly. I thought I recognized him last 
night. I saw him at that big party of the Ostler West- 
cott's I went to with Mrs. Frank Lorimer, when you had 
a headache, and couldn't go — you remember ? He stood 
in a corner and shoals of people were taken and intro- 
duced to him, and he glared at them like a wild beast in 
a cage/ 

‘Dear me, how very disagreeable/ remarked Madame 


94 


The Wages of Sin. 


Jacobini. * In any case he has departed now. There he 
goes down the steps.’ 

‘ I meant to have asked who he wa§, and then we went, 
or I forgot, or something ’ 

‘ Oh ! here you are, Polly. That’s all right. I’ve been 
hunting all over the place for you. It was the merest 
chance I found you. Why have you turned your chair 
round the wrong way ? ’ 

Madame Jacobini received the speaker, Lancelot, with 
one of her wide genial smiles. She had a great kindness 
for this good-looking, simple-minded, far-away cousin. — 

‘ Mary and I always turn our chairs the wrong way on 
principle. It is an assertion of personal liberty, a private 
declaration of independence.’ 

‘ I can’t sit in a row,’ said Miss Crookenden. ' It is so 
terribly inartistic to sit in a row. That is a refinement of 
feeling you don’t appreciate, Lance. You would always be 
willing to sit in a row.’ 

The young man smiled down at her with a very pretty 
mixture of adoration, protection, and endearment. — ‘ Oh ! 
I don’t know, Polly,’ he said, good-humouredly. ‘ 1 never 
thought about it. I suppose I generally do what everybody 
else does. It doesn’t seem to be worth while to be peculiar, 
you know, unless there’s a good deal to be gained 
by it.* 

Nevertheless he turned a chair round, and placed it in 
close proximity to his cousin’s. 

‘Aldham and Carr will be here directly,’ he added, 
as he did so. ‘ They stopped to speak to some man on 
the steps. — I say, Madame Jacobini, what’s the matter? 
Why are you laughing ? ’ 

‘ I only wondered whether you gained a good deal on 
the present occasion by being peculiar.’ 

Lancelot waited before replying. Perhaps he did not 
catch her meaning at first. — ‘Yes, I believe I do, Madame 
Jacobini,’ he said presently, very quietly. ‘And I mean 
to make the most of it. I am afraid it mayn’t last.’ 

Mary turned her charming head away. 

‘ Ah ! here they come ! ’ she said. ‘ My dear Lance, 
what has happened to you ? You become oracular.’ — 
Then, without waiting for an answer, she rose and went 


Miss Mary Crookenden. 


95 


a step or two forward to meet the two gentlemen as they 
advanced slowly towards her. 

Madame Jacobini, hitching up her' mantle about her 
shoulders, moved forward also. As we have said, this 
good woman had a remarkable gift for the perception of 
drama. It led her not infrequently to commit indiscretions. 
Now, as Lancelot got up and stood aside to let her pass, 
she read, or fancied she read a silent appeal in his ex- 
pression. She was soft-hearted and it moved her. — ‘ It 
will last/ she said, implulsively. ‘ Don't be afraid. It 
ought to lhst. It must last — that is if you really want 
it to.’ 

‘Want it to? — Why/ the lad broke out, ‘why I've 
never wanted anything else as long as I can remember.' 

Madame Jacobini opened her mouth and brought her 
teeth together with a little snap. 

‘Eh! eh! my dear young man !' she said softly. The 
drama was of a profounder character than she had anti- 
cipated. Where there is smoke there is always fire, 
says the proverb. But in this case she had been quite 
unprepared to see the flame blaze up so brightly. 


Chapter V 

At this point I must request the reader to picture to 
himself Cupid as a bachelor of fifty, well-preserved, fault- 
lessly arrayed in accordance with the existing fashion; 
his wanton humours reduced to a dainty discretion ; his 
freakishness sobered by a large acquaintance with the world. 
Cupid, in short, as an accomplished gentleman of to-day. 
A person of means, of leisure, and elegant tastes ; a . suc- 
cessful amateur of the fine arts, with a pretty little talent 
for music, painting, and the writing of fiction ; and a con- 
siderable influence in that section of society where art 
and letters join hands with the smart world. Picture 
this, I say, and you have a very fair portrait of Mr. Adol- 
phus Carr. 

During some months in the year it was Mr. Carr's habit 
to keep open house at his charming place in Sussex. 


96 


The Wages of Sin . 


But, notwithstanding his graceful gift of landscape paint- 
ing, the pavement was more congenial to him than the 
long upward roll of the Sussex downs, the hanging woods 
and rich hop-gardens of that delectable county. I may 
add, perhaps, that the opera was more congenial to him 
than the singing of birds; and the elaborate posturings 
of some fair figurante than the gambols of those rather 
overrated quadrupeds, the young lambs, whether bounding 
— as in the pages of the poets — to the sound of the tabor, 
or in alarmed response to the barking of the sheep-dog, as 
in ordinary life. Simple tastes are, after all, Among the 
most difficult things in the world to cultivate. Mr. Can- 
extolled the country but he loved the town. Discretion 
was his forte. Even in the privacy of his own mind he 
practised a certain ingenious indirectness. Otherwise he 
would probably have asserted that there is a distressing 
element of nakedness, so to speak, in the country. It is 
all so terribly definite. Its few inhabitants, and the 
manners and customs of them, are so clearly recognizable, 
as almost indecently distinct. 

This being the attitude of Mr. Carr's mind it will readily 
be understood that, upon the evening in question, as he 
advanced down the gallery, through the spaces of tinted 
shadow and tempered brightness, surrounded by the close- 
packed, well-dressed, slow-moving crowd; and bowed, 
finally, with discreetly affectionate civility over the hand 
of our highly-finished young lady, Miss Crookenden, his 
soul was satisfied, he was comfortable in spirit, he was 
entirely at his ease. There was no distressing element 
of nakedness here. Civilization had gone far towards 
doing her perfect work. Nature, whether human or other- 
wise, was agreeably removed from its primitive, rudi- 
mentary conditions. There was no shocking directness 
about it. It was all modestly veiled — in a sense at least. 

But Mr. Carr was nothing if not polite. He imme- 
diately began to account for himself with an air of ad- 
mirably serious mildness. 

‘We should have presented ourselves sooner, Miss 
Crookenden — how d’ye do, Madame Jacobini? A delight- 
ful evening, isn’t it ? Even our English climate has its 
happy moments. Yes, as I was saying, we should have 


Miss Mary Crookenden . 


97 


been here before — ah ! there is Crookenden ! He ran 
away from us— but I happened to see James Colthurst 
— you know his pictures ? Yes, of course. — And Aldham 
was anxious to be introduced to him/ 

Mr. Carr arranged himself neatly in a chair between 
the two ladies. In talking he always had the effect of 
communicating a secret of grave importance to his 
auditors, which must on no account be allowed to go 
any further, as the phrase is. This is a most useful style 
of manner. It is obviously complimentary to the hearer, 
while it practically leaves the speaker in full possession 
of the conversation. For who would be so indelicate as 
to interrupt the teller of a secret ? 

' Colthurst is a singular person. There is an immense 
amount of force in him — something cosmic, really cosmic. 
You know him by sight, Miss Crookenden, of course ? * 
The young lady made a sign of dissent. 

Lancelot shifted his position, causing the legs of his 
chair to scroop on the asphalt . — * Have you had any very 
jolly music to-night, Madame Jacobini ? ’ he asked, sud- 
denly. 

But Mr. Carr went forward serenely with his narration. 

' No really, Miss Crookenden ? I should have thought 
you must have seen him. He is peculiar looking, and he 
has been about a good deal this season. I have been in- 
terested in him for some time, I confess. The prejudice 
against his work has been very strong; even now it 
yields unwillingly. He belongs to the school of Bastien- 
Lepage, and in a degree to that of Jean Francois Millet/ 

' More to that of Bastien-Lepage than of Millet, I should 
say/ put in Aldham, smiling. 

'Yes, perhaps. The religious element certainly is not 
conspicuous. There was a picture of his some years ago 
in the Grosvenor — you would hardly remember it, Miss 
Crookenden — which brought a storm of abuse down upon 
him. It was not pleasant, I own. Still, I thought at the 
time, and I still think, the expression of feeling it called 
out was exaggerated. He is a realist, of course, and of 
a very pronounced type. But his realism is not devoid 
of poetry. There is nothing really objectionable in it — 
nothing gross/ 


H 


98 


The Wages of Sin . 


Lancelot who, since his unsuccessful sally, had been 
leaning forward with his elbows on the arms of his chair, 
and apparently making a critical examination of the pave- 
ment between his feet, here glanced up at Cyprian 
Aldham. 

* That depends upon what you mean by gross/ he 
murmured. 

1 His pictures are detestably melancholy, in any case/ 
broke in Madame Jacobini. 1 My dear Mr. Carr, you can- 
not deny it. They are assomant. But there ! so is all 
the art of the present day. Tout lasse, tout passe , tout 
casse — that is what it is for ever telling you. Preach, 
preach, preach ! — I am not abusing sermons, Mr. Aldham. 
They are most edifying things in their proper place, and 
no one enjoys listening to a good one more than I do. 
But sermons in action, and when you want to cheer and 
comfort your eyes with the sight of something pretty too, 
— it is prodigiously trying. I don't need to go to a picture 
gallery to learn that there are miserable, paralytic, pitiable 
objects in the world, like that wretched old drover in “ The 
Evening of Labour.” Or that there are foolish young 
men and women either, with whom repentance will pro- 
bably come too late. “ The Road to Ruin,” now, 
what ’ 

At this juncture Mary Crookenden's large white feather 
fan slipped, with a little crash, on to the ground. 

1 Ah, how stupid of me. Thanks; no, it is not broken. 
This is not its first tumble, poor thing. I am always for- 
getting it. I must have a ribbon put on to it/ she said, 
in her low, sweet voice, as Aldham picked it up and pre- 
sented it to her. 

1 Oh ! yes, I sympathize to a very great extent.' — Mr. 
Carr addressed himself to Madame Jacobini . — ‘ Colthurst’s 
work does strain too much, I admit. It is restlessly full 
of intention. Yet it is impossible not to respect him. 
He has shown such dogged persistence in the face of 
adverse criticism. He has submitted to poverty, real 
pressing poverty for years — that I know on the best 
authority — rather than paint for mere popularity. And 
with his great technical skill, he might easily have been 
popular had he pleased. He deserves his success in that 


Mtss Maty Crookenden. 


99 


way, at all events. He has paid a severe price for it. 
False or true he has suffered for his faith.’ 

* That is fine,’ Mary Crookenden said, slowly. * I don’t 
think we have any of us done that quite, have we ? ' she 
went on, diligently smoothing and arranging the feathers 
composing her fan, crumpled by their fall . — * Sara, I 
know you would give your head for the triumph of Italian 
over German opera. And Mr. Aldham, I am sure, would 
suffer directly if necessary — die joyfully for a dogma. 
And Lance would be shot at the shortest possible notice 
for — oh ! for a whole lot of things — even if he did not 
quite understand what they were — if I begged him very 
nicely to be shot. And I — no doubt there are founts of 
heroism in me also.’ 

The young girl clasped her hands and surveyed her 
companions with a strange little laugh. Two of the said 
companions, at least, though startled by her words, found 
her most bewilderingly lovely just then. 

' But nobody wants us to suffer. Nobody wants to 
martyr us. Nobody will take the trouble to give us a 
chance of showing off our fine qualities.’ — She bent for- 
ward, smiling . — 1 Mr. Carr, will you do me a great kind- 
ness ? ’ 

1 With the sincerest pleasure — any in the world, short 
of supplying you with an opportunity for martyrdom, 
my dear Miss Crookenden,’ he answered, suavely. 

1 Go and find Mr. Colthurst then, and bring him here, 
and introduce me to him. I want to know somebody who 
has ’ — Mary stopped suddenly, and laughed again. * Is 
it not rather absurd though ? ’ she said. * Am I not 
making a mountain out of a mole-hill ? Look at all this, 
at the lights, the fountains — listen to that valse tune. Is 
there any such grisly thing as suffering after all ? Any 
such thing as poverty ? Or as convictions ? Surely 
they are all delusions. Well then, if they are, it will be 
all the more entertaining to make Mr. Colthurst’s ac- 
quaintance. It will be all the more diverting to see a 
rea’ist — when one knows there is nothing really real — 
a realist who has gone the length of actually suffering, 
suffering that most odious of all things too, poverty, for 
the sake of his — yes, they must be so — his delusions ! ’ 

h 2 


IOO 


The Wages of Sin . 


For once Mr. Carr's tact deserted him. Miss Crooken- 
cen's address had taken all her hearers by surprise. 
Aldham was not only surprised but annoyed. His idol 
was presenting herself in a new aspect. Aldham was by 
no means weak, though he was in love. There were 
points, he began to think, in which his idol would bear 
slight reconstruction. He felt entirely equal to carrying 
out such reconstruction when the time should arrive. 
His expression grew severe, for he objected to being sur- 
prised — specially by a woman. 

Mr. Carr, on his part, was not only surprised, but 
embarrassed. He had interested himself warmly in 
Colthurst’s fortunes. Had interested critics in him too ; 
had spoken a good word for him to newspaper editors; 
had presented him to capitalists with a hankering after 
modern pictures ; had, in short — for notwithstanding his 
artificiality and general slightness of make this elderly 
Cupid was extremely kind-hearted — had, I say, done a 
large amount of wire-pulling and discreet puffing. But 
it is quite one thing to help forward a struggling artist 
yourself, and quite another to present him to a very 
exquisite young lady, possessed of two thousand a year 
and an enthusiasm for the fine arts — a young lady of 
whose charms you have so high an appreciation, that 
possibilities of the tenderest description have presented 
themselves more than once to your imagination. 

Moreover there were queer rumours about James Colt- 
hurst. Mr. Carr was not one of those who give proof of 
their own immaculate cleanliness by much curious in- 
spection of their neighbours’ dust-bins. He let the 
rumours rest. He neither inquired into them, nor re- 
peated them. That the painter had lived pretty hard, he 
thought more than possible. But it was really no business 
of his. Social life was in his opinion a nicely constructed 
show, wherein a good deal necessarily went on behind 
the scenes, which was not intended for the eyes of the 
public seated in the boxes, stalls, or pit. The actors 
were at their best upon the stage. Common courtesy de- 
mands that it is by the figure they cut there you should 
judge them. To pursue them into the dressing-rooms, 
and examine them wigless and unpainted ; to note the 


Miss Mary Crookenden. 


IOI 


peculiarities of the poor, knock-kneed, would-be king, 
queen, or courtier, deprived of all bravery of buckram 
and tinsel, is a stupidity and outrage. Yet liberal-minded 
as he was —liberal-minded many good persons will doubt- 
less remark to the verge of laxity — Adolphus Carr per- 
mitted himself a measure of discrimination. He would 
not cast a stone — heaven forbid ! — at any one. But he 
held that men are divisible into several orders. And that 
one of these is composed of individuals, who, though 
most agreeable companions to members of their own sex, 
are not equally eligible acquaintances for young, unmarried 
ladies whom you hold in the most respectful esteem. 

‘ I shall be delighted/ he said, after a perceptible inter- 
val of hesitation. 

Lancelot had risen uneasily from his seat. He stood 
resting one hand on the back of his cousin’s chair. The 
young man was acutely uncomfortable. He wanted to put 
a stop to the whole matter. But words did not come 
readily to him. He did not see how to say anything 
without saying too much. 

1 Delighted of course ’ — Carr went on, passing one lady- 
like hand over his cheek, and toying a little with his 
eye-glass — * if I can find Mr. Colthurst. But I fancy he 
was leaving when we met him. And there is this further 
little difficulty. He is, as I remarked just now, a peculiar 
person, Miss Crookenden. He is rather shy, rather gauche } 

I must own. And he has an honest horror of being 
lionized. Perhaps he may not appreciate his good fortune. 
It is even conceivable that he may refuse to obey your 
summons.’ 

To make this rejoinder went sorely against the grain 
with Adolphus Carr. It was, he felt, anything but a 
graceful speech to address to a lady. But he trusted it 
might give his fair neighbour a hint which would make her 
abstain from insisting on her request. As he finished 
speaking he cast a discreetly meaning glance upon Madame 
Jacobini enlisting her support and intervention. — Her 
response was prompt. 

*Ah! look, Mary!’ she cried, with much animation, 

‘ there is our bone' of contention again. Mr. Carr shall 
decide. Miss Crookenden and I have had a warm discus- 


102 


The Wages of Sin. 


sion as to the nationality of that particularly plain person. 
I say he is a Russian ; but Miss Crookenden declares ’ — 

‘ 1 declare nothing. I am very much bored by our bone 
of contention/ the girl remarked, coolly. 

‘ No, no/ the elder lady insisted. ‘ It is a point of 
honour with me to be right in my nationalities. We will 
have Mr. Carr’s opinion. You see the man, there ? He 
is unmistakeable. He has the figure of a bear, and he 
walks like a cat.* 

* Great Scott ! ’ murmured Lancelot Crookenden. 

The young man had been quick for once. A good 
deal quicker than Adolphus Carr, indeed. The latter 
put up his eye-glass daintily, and gazed in the direction 
indicated.- Presently he dropped it again, and dangled it 
by its single, fine, gold cord with a certain deliberation. 
He did not echo Lancelot’s crude little expression of feel- 
ing; but he, too, feared that Madame Jacobini had very 
neatly and completely performed the feat commonly known 
as jumping out of the frying-pan into the fire. 

‘Well?i’ demanded that lady. ‘Well?’ 

‘ You are mistaken in your nationality on the present 
occasion/ Carr answered. ‘That is the person we have 
been speaking of — Mr. James Colthurst, the painter.’ 

‘Eh! eh !' — and Madame Jacobini’s little grimace was 
expressive of considerable relief. She was disposed to 
applaud the guardian angels, and congratulate them on 
behaving with most praiseworthy tact for once. She 
looked across maliciously at Mary Crookenden. 

It happened that Mr. Aldham was observing Miss 
Crookenden also. His lips were compressed and his 
expression somewhat hard. He was not at all pleased. 
But displeasure did not make Aldham turn away. He 
did not spare himself. He looked closely, as a rule, at 
that which displeased him. Is it conceivable that he 
derived a subtle satisfaction from his own displeasure, 
that it ministered to his sense of his own superiority? 
Adolphus Carr’s announcement had evidently taken Miss 
Crookenden altogether by surprise. Aldham saw her 
start. She rarely blushed, and she did not do so on this 
occasion. But her eyes dilated curiously. They appeared 
actually to glow with intensity of colour. Aldham noted 


Miss Mary Crookenden. 


103 


a pause of indecision. Then she rose with a charming, 
indolent dignity, and addressed Mr. Carr. — ‘ Ah ! ' she 
said, ‘if that is Mr. Colthurst, I don’t think he will 
refuse, if you will kindly ask him to come and speak to 
us.' 

‘ But, my dear Mary, just consider — surely ' broke 

in Madame Jacobini, aghast, mindful of precipices, and 
very distrustful of guardian angels again. 

Pride had made Miss Crookenden perverse. She had 
inadvertently got into a difficult position. She would 
have been glad to escape from it. But she had, so she 
thought, committed herself too far. And in her desire to 
appear quite mistress of herself, she over-acted her part. 

‘ Surely what, Sara ? ’ she inquired, innocently. ‘ What 
is the matter ? Can’t you recover having made a mistake 
in your nationalities? What a pity it is we hadn’t a 
small bet about the matter. I might have won a pair 
of gloves.’ 

Miss Crookenden held out her fan with a pretty air of 
command. Her eyes dilated again. Still her manner was 
faultlessly quiet, the tones of her voice gravely sweet. 

‘Dear Mr. Carr, if you value my friendship, go and 
catch Mr. Colthurst and bring him here. Madame Jacobini 
has called him a bear ; well, then, -let him be made to 
dance for us. It would be something new. I have been 
longing for something to happen, and this would suit me 
so nicely, for I have not seen a dancing bear for an age, 
and I dote on them. The last one I saw was at Brattle- 
worthy. You must remember it, Lancelot. It came with 
two Frenchmen in blue blouses. It had on a big muzzle, 
poor dear beast, which looked horribly uncomfortable. 
And we fed it with cake on the lawn in front of the 
dining-room window.’ 

‘ This bear’s another question,’ Lancelot answered. ‘ I 
wouldn’t try giving it cake.' 

‘ Go, Mr. Carr, please,’ Mary repeated, with gentle in- 
sistence. 

Here Madame Jacobini emitted a sound expressive of 
lively irritation. It may be rendered by the following 
alphabetical combination — ‘Tschah!’ Then she turned 
upon Cyprian Aldham and inquired very briskly when 


104 


The Wages of Sin. 


and by what route he proposed travelling out to Switzer- 
land. 

1 It — I — well, you know, Polly, I wish awfully you'd let 
it be,' blundered out poor Lancelot. 1 We are very well 
as we are. He’ll only be in the way. And between our- 
selves, I don’t fancy that fellow Colthurst’s looks a bit 
better than I do his pictures. I don’t believe he’s the 
sort of man for you to know. I’d very much rather you 
had nothing to do with him.’ 

But the remonstrance came too late. Mr. Carr, to 
whom anything in the form of even a verbal struggle was 
highly distasteful, had started on his little mission. The 
fact, meanwhile, that she knew herself to be in an equivocal 
position disposed Miss Crookenden to be resentful. When 
a woman has perpetrated a folly she usually revenges 
herself first upon the friend who has done his best to 
save her from perpetrating it. Mary, therefore, turned 
upon the devoted youth and incontinently smote him hip 
and thigh, veiling her blows under the most delightful 
smiles. 

Dear old boy,’ she said, 1 do you know you really are a 
wee bit stupid and tiresome ? I am afraid our tastes 
differ fundamentally. You are happiest with frumps. I 
am happiest with clever people. I like them. I like people 
who make a fight and get on, and distinguish themselves. 

I will even go a little out of my way to know them. Don’t 
try to interfere, Lance. Understand, once and for all, it 
is no use interfering.’ 

Lancelot answered bravely enough. He looked her 
straight in the eyes. But his smooth, sunburnt face grew 
rather pale, and his lips trembled. 

1 All right, Polly. There are some things I understand 
fast enough, though I am stupid and tiresome. I suppose 
I’ve been a fool. But I promise you I shan’t interfere 
again. I’ll remember. 

Then he turned his back. He took a long, steady 
breath, filling his fine chest, and holding himself very 
upright — a young Hercules, though in regulation black 
coat and high collar — while he gazed down in a sort of 
amazement at the gay scene spread out before him. ’ To 
his sight it had changed strangely in the last few moments ; 


Miss Mary Crookenden. 105 

had become mocking, heartless, bewildering. He felt 
oddly alone, oddly aware of himself — cut off from his 
companions. Lancelot was a very simple fellow. He 
accepted his cousin’s cruel little speech without criticism, 
without resentment. He was nothing to her. He was 
too dull, too common-place. Of course Polly had a per- 
fect right to send him about his business if she felt 
like that. He did not blame her. Perhaps it was really 
the kindest thing she could do under the circumstances. 
But it made him sad, very sad. And that sensation was 
a new one. In all his easy, pleasant, sweet-tempered 
life he had never been very sad before — at least, not in 
this same intimate, personal, penetrating way. It altered 
the relative value of everything. The landmarks were all 
changing ; and great shadows, such as he had never seen 
till now, seemed to blot and chill his mental landscape. 
His frank, innocent, wholesome world had a sudden blight 
cast on it. If the sun rose to-morrow morning, it would 
be a different sun with less light and heat than of old. 

And then, as he stared at the hundreds of men and 
women about him, he began to wonder if any of them 
felt, or ever had felt, just as he did now ? It was surely 
a very gracious token of the lad’s nature, that almost the 
first effect of his realization of personal suffering was this 
out-going of sympathy towards possible companions in 
misfortune. 


Chapter VI. 

Every one remembers the story of the fisherman, on the 
far Eastern sea-shore, investigating the contents of the 
bottle lying among the wrack in the sand — remembers 
the out-rush of the geni, enormous, vaguely menacing. 
Even Oriental impassivity and politeness failed, under 
consequent sensations, neatly, gracefully, composedly, to 
embark in ordinary conversation. The fisherman was 
horribly frightened —for a time, anyhow. 

And it is hardly too much to assert that, at this particu- 
lar juncture, Miss Crookenden came very near realizing 
the embar;assing sensations experienced by the said 


io6 


The Wages of Sin. 


fisherman. In light-hearted, wilful curiosity she had un- 
corked a bottle, thrown up by the restless tide of social 
life at her feet. And certainly it appeared to her, when 
Colthurst, after a brief colloquy with Adolphus Carr, came 
forward in obedience to her summons and bowed, hat in 
hand, before her, that from out of it she had let loose an 
odd and even alarming sort of being. If she had been a 
little doubtful of the wisdom of her escapade before, she 
was doubly doubtful of it now. For once in her life she 
felt at a disadvantage. She turned shy and nervous. 
Something in Colthurst’s presence, in his restless, com- 
prehensive glances, disconcerted her. She feared she 
had adopted a role she was unequal to playing. Like the 
fisherman, polite conversation failed her. Like him, she 
was frightened. 

For the effect of some persons is immediate and unde- 
niable. You cannot help being aware of them. They 
have an extraordinary power of charging the surrounding 
atmosphere with the magnetism of their own personality. 
It is of this queer power, I suppose, that Goethe wrote 
under the title of 'the daemonic influence’; and of which 
he says that, though not necessarily malign, it is, at first, 
almost invariably repulsive. And no wonder ; for it puts 
out strong hands, and grasps at just those secret places 
of the soul which ordinary human intercourse, ordinary 
human affections, leave wholly undisturbed, reposing in 
comfortably unintelligent silence and obscurity. 

The last bars of Strauss’ brilliant valse, — rapid and still 
more rapid, riotous almost, as it neared its conclusion, — 
were being rattled out by the band. Possibly the stern 
roll of the kettledrums and fierce clang of the cymbals, 
the breathless rush of hurrying notes ringing in her ears, 
helped to trouble Miss Crookenden. A final crash. Then 
an interval of comparative silence, through which James 
Colthurst’s whispering, stammering accents rose into 
singular distinctness and importance. 

* I am very much honoured by your permitting Mr. Carr 
to p-present me to you,’ he said. ' I believe we have a 
common ground of interest, Miss Crookenden. I under- 
stand that you draw and paint well.’ 

The speech was abrupt in its directness. The speaker 


Miss Mary Crookenden, 


107 


was abrupt, too, dominating, engrossing, possessive. — 
Just then a dropping fire of applause, tribute to the ex- 
cellence of the musical performance lately concluded, 
broke from the crowded audience upon the terrace and 
gallery. To Mary Crookenden, coming at that particular 
moment, this had a startling effect. It heightened her 
sense of embarrassment. For it seemed as though she 
and the man standing before her formed the centre of 
attention ; as though this great concourse of human beings 
had come together to witness their first meeting. A fateful 
element seemed suddenly to have intruded itself amid the 
frivolous common-places of the evening. Mary had a 
fantastic feeling that a magic circle was being drawn 
around her, isolating her mysteriously with this stranger. 

Instead of answering him, she turned half away, in 
sudden absurd shrinking from this imaginary publicity, in 
unreasoning desire for protection and escape. But none 
of her company of friends appeared disposed to come to 
her rescue. Lancelot's back was still towards her as he 
stared sadly out over the illuminated gardens. Aldham 
was nearer. He was watching her. But there was no 
softening of helpfulness, rather a reserve and doubtfully 
complimentary criticism, in his expression. Miss Crook- 
enden divined that he, too, disapproved of her action. 
Adolphus Carr’s ladylike countenance presented a civil 
blank. If the present situation in any way approximated 
to a * free fight,’ Mr. Carr evidently wished devoutly to 
be counted not ‘ in,' but ‘ out.’ Madame Jacobini, more- 
over, showed an unsympathetic front. She was adjusting 
her mantle impatiently about her angular shoulders, 
talking loudly to everybody and nobody at the same time, 
with a rather ostentatious show of indifference. 

‘ Do pray let us walk about,’ she said. 1 It is growing 
shockingly chilly. — The music is over, I suppose. They 
do play superbly; but I shall be quite content to hear 
God save the Queen, at a distance, all the same. The 
throne will be none the firmer for my standing still here 
and catching a violent cold in my head listening to the 
National Anthem. — Yes, you’re perfectly right, Mr. Carr ; 
brass is the only thing that tells out of doors. Strings 
are nowhere. They are far too delicate for the open 


io8 


The Wages of Sin. 


air.’ — Madame Jacobini turned to the young girl. — ‘Are 
you coming, Mary ? We are going to see the illumination 
of the big fountains, and then I am going home/ 

As she spoke the lady treated Colthurst to the minutest 
fraction of a bow, subjecting him at the same time to a 
pretty searching scrutiny. She looked him well up and 
down, as the phrase is, and during that process the ex- 
pression was far from conciliatory. 

Miss Crookenden had asked bread of her friends, and 
it seemed to her that one and all of them presented hei 
with the first stone that came handy. Lancelot's back, 
Cyprian’s face, Mr. Carr’s rather pusillanimous attitude, 
the tones of Madame Jacobini’s voice, were alike discou- 
raging. Everybody was unkind — so it seemed to the girl. 
Instead of helping her out of a difficulty, they combined 
to push her deeper into it. She rallied her pride. She 
determined to show them that she did not care one bit. 
Again she overacted her part. 

* Oh ! pray on no account catch cold, Sara,’ she said, 
gravely. ‘ Your colds are a public calamity ; they put out 
all one’s plans. And that would be by no means amusing, 
just on the eve of going abroad. I am prepared not only 
to walk, but actually to run about, if it would prevent 
your catching one. Please, Mr. Carr, don't allow her to 
stand still a single minute longer.’ — Then she turned with 
a very pretty smile to Colthurst. — ‘ Whoever told you I 
draw and paint well was more kind than truthful,’ she said. 
‘ But one does not quarrel very much with one’s friends’ 
untruthfulness if it helps to procure one an introduction 
to some one whom one is happy to know. — Would you 
mind taking this for me ? I cannot agree with Madame 
Jacobini that it’s chilly to-night, and so I should be 
glad to spare myself the weight of this thick cloak. — 
Thanks so much — oh yes, that sketch book ! If you will 
kindly poke it well down into the pocket, it will be quite 
safe.’ 

Colthurst was not much used to acting as a squire of 
dames. He gathered up the pale green cache misere 
hanging over the back of Miss Crookenden’s chair, and 
pushed the sketch-book back into the pocket of it, under 
an odd sense of excitement. The straight, proud glance 


Miss Mary Crookenden . 


109 


of the young girl’s eyes, her grave voice, her languid 
manner, stirred his blood. The two natures in Colthurst 
played their game of. skill now, as persistently, and, for 
his own peace of mind, as dangerously, as they had 
played it ten years ago. And as the soft, rich folds of 
Mary Crookenden’s cloak fell across his arm, the emotional 
nature was undoubtedly in the ascendant. 

Madame Jacobini, meanwhile, as she led the way 
along the gallery, . down the steps, across the crowded 
terrace, and into a narrow alley on the right of the gar- 
dens, — Adolphus Carr talking, ignoring the prevailing 
sense of slight discomfort, with all his might, at her side, 
— Madame Jacobini raged inwardly. For she did not in 
the very least like the turn affairs had taken. 

1 Mary flirts most unconscionably,’ she said to herself. 
And then directly she had said it she repented. The 
judgment was too harsh a one. For she knew perfectly 
well that Miss Crookenden probably cared no more to 
. stimulate the admiration of this new acquaintance than 
she would have cared to stimulate the admiration of one 
of the turncocks managing the waterworks, or the elec- 
tricians managing the dynamos . — 1 But how is he to know 
that, wretched man ? ’ she continued. * Of course, he will 
imagine she finds him enchanting.’ 

Madame Jacobini, on the contrary, did not find James 
Colthurst in the least enchanting, though she admitted she 
had been guilty of an exaggeration in describing him as an 
oblique-eyed Tartar. He was tall — about five feet eleven 
and a half, to be quite accurate ; but a short neck and high, 
square shoulders detracted considerably from the effect of 
his height, and made the upper part of his person appear 
somewhat unwieldy. His chest was deep, and he held 
himself well. His arms were rather short; his hands 
handsome, finely modelled, full of character, broad in the 
palm, and very prettily set into the wrist. Colthurst knew 
this. He was very fond of his own hands and wrists. 
They afforded him considerable satisfaction, and he always 
wore large, open wristbands, so as to afford them free play 
and exhibition. 

In his make, as a whole, there was a singular combina- 
tion of finish and clumsiness. Madame Jacobini, glancing 


IIO 


The Wages of Sin. 


at his long, neat legs and small feet, felt sure he must 
be an extremely good dancer. His head was large — wide 
when seen in profile, the distance from the nostril to the 
base of the skull being remarkable, yet the actual masque 
was rather narrow and square in shape. A deep horizontal 
line crossed the forehead, dividing it into two distinct 
portions, of which the lower one bulged noticeably over 
the eyebrows. Colthurst's eyes were reddish brown, 
opaque, and in form long and narrow, ‘unshaded by much 
eyelash. They were sunk in close under the rim of the 
eye-socket, causing the upper lids almost to disappear 
when open. He had no hair on his face, save a fringed, 
rusty-red moustache, growing up away from the lip and 
leaving the mouth uncovered. His teeth were even and 
rather long. His skin had the dull sallow tone of a 
person not greatly addicted to country air and exercise. 

It is needless to state that Madame Jacobini did not 
draw out this detailed inventory of the merits and de- 
merits of James Colthurst's personal appearance as she 
treated him to a repressively curt bow on that particular 
July evening. She received no more than a general im- 
pression, in which bear and cat still claimed about equal 
shares. But subsequent events impressed his looks and 
bearing, his hissing hesitating speech, his quick deft 
movements, the restless energy which possessed him and 
which he constantly strove to veil under an easy, pliant 
manner — subsequent events impressed all these, I say, 
indelibly upon her memory. There were times when she 
positively loathed him. There were others — for she was, 
as we know, a woman of generous instincts, easily moved 
to compassion — when she was drawn to him by strong 
pity. But all that' came much later. To-night she re- 
garded him merely as a very superfluous addition to her 
little party, as an unexplained, unaccounted-for sort of 
person, and consequently as a most undesirable cavalier 
for Mary Crookenden — a cavalier whom that self-willed 
and misleading young lady must be coerced or cajoled 
into dropping as soon as possible. 

Immediately, however, Madame Jacobini perceived that 
Miss Crookenden displayed not the slightest intention of 
dropping him. For Mary had quite recovered her self- 


Miss Mary Crookenden. 


ii 


possession. She even found her late sensation of alarm 
ridiculous. 

This man was very much as other men are, after alt — 
an amiable, obedient geni, quite willing to carry super- 
fluous garments and pilot you safely through a crowd ; 
a bear, ready enough to dance to any tune a fair damsel 
might please to play to him. Mary embarked in pretty 
speeches, which gained a value and charm she was really 
quite innocent of intending, from her smiling lips and the 
gentle gravity of her voice. She complimented Colthurst 
delicately, more by implication than direct assertion, upon 
his recently achieved renown. 

1 It must be a delicious sensation/ she said, 1 to know 
that one has emerged ; that one has done supremely well 
what so many try and fail to do.' The girl laughed a 
little, and her eyes had that glowing light in them. 1 1 can 
imagine nothing more inspiring, more satisfying than to 
have realized one’s dreams, and made a great artistic 
success.' 

They were standing on the steps leading down from the 
terrace. Before them the narrow alley, deserted, save for 
two dark figures — Madame Jacobini's and Mr. Carr’s — on 
ahead, stretched out in long perspective. On one side of 
it a miniature stone-edged canal, spanned by lines of 
lanterns, on the other a bank of shrubbery dotted by 
coloured lamps. The interlacing shadows of the foliage 
played over the stone steps ; the soft, tempered colours 
thrown by the lanterns stained the whiteness of Miss 
Crookenden's gown. The whole scene was fairy-like, 
unreal, provoking to the senses. Colthurst stopped, he 
could not resist doing so, and looked full at his companion. 
— 1 There is plenty of snow,’ he thought, * but I’m very 
much mistaken if there is not plenty of fire underneath 
the snow.’ 

Then he answered her rather floridly, trying to over- 
come his stammer by speaking in that quick, whispering- 
way of his. 

‘ I am afraid success, like most other fine things, looks 
b-best at a distance, Miss Crookenden. You are thirsty 
for it ; you see it ahead ; you press on feverishly towards 
the great cool levels ; you stoop down to plunge your 


1 12 


The Wages of Sin . 


hands in it, and you scoop up nothing but dry sand 
Success is a mirage, which leaves you as thirsty as it 
found you in the end.’ 

1 Ah, that is sad — sad/ Mary Crookenden said — 1 too 
sad to be quite true, surely ! 9 

‘ You d-don't like what's sad ? 9 

1 Who does ? ’ she asked, smiling again. 

1 Yes, I know. — And yet you had better try to like 
it, because the truth is always sad/ Colthurst said, quite 
gently. * The great fundamental facts are not only sad, 
they are almost hideous. That is why nature tries to hide 
them under leaves and flowers, and glories of colour, and 
of light and shadow ; and why we try to hide them under 
poetry and art. That is why, taking it at a lower level, 
we lay out gardens, make fountains play, light up lamps. 
In a common-place way even these trivialities help to 
hide the “ accepted hells beneath/’ the ugly bases of our 
life — birth, death, and — well, you have read Schopenhauer, 
Miss Crookenden ? You remember his anatomy of what 
we glorify under the name of love ? ’ 

But Miss Crookenden had not read Schopenhauer. She 
said so promptly, and walked on down the steps ; for it 
appeared to her this bear was beginning to dance to unex- 
pected and rather discordant tunes. 

* I can't believe that success is all mirage and dry sand/ 
she said. 

1 Oh, no ! not quite all/ Colthurst answered. * I don't 
care about going into society. But after having been less 
than nobody all your life, there is a certain pleasure in 
seeing your name in print, and in having countesses ask 
you to crushes — even if it is chiefly the pleasure of thinking 
your critics fools for their pains, and of refusing the fine 
ladies’ invitations. Success obtains you these small 
gratifications. And then success brings money ; and 
money is the one absolute good in life. You think it 
rather base to say so ? That, probably, is because you 
have never known what it is to have to do without money, 
Miss Crookenden. Money sets you free — as far as free- 
dom is p-possible. It enables you to go where you like 
see what you like, do — within certain limits — what you 
like. You hardly measure all money can buy, perhaps.' 


Miss Mary Crookenden. 


113 

Colthurst had stopped again, and again he looked full at 
his companion. A little breeze swayed the spanning lines 
of lanterns. The frail, warm colours chased each other 
across the girl's white muslin dress. He could hear the 
silk lining of her bodice give a soft, creaking rustle as 
she breathed. The emotional side of his nature was very 
much in the ascendant, just then. 

‘ And there are innumerable things I want to b-buy,' he 
went on, hesitating a good deal, ' and to d-do, and places 
I want to see. Do you know, Miss Crookenden, what it 
is to have nostalgia of the whole ? To get mad to see 
all the world and the fashion of it ? To make your salut 
au monde , in short. — There is no place I don’t want to 
see — except P-Paris.’ 

{ And why not Paris ? ’ Mary asked, glad to be able to 
say something, for she was conscious of vague but growing 
discomfort as she listened. 

Colthurst glanced at her sharply, queerly, for a moment. 

‘ I hate Paris,’ he stammered. 1 1 should be extremely 
g-glad if fire and b-brimstone could be rained down out of 
heaven, or out of anywhere else for that matter, upon Paris. 
A little event of the sort would give me infinite satisfaction.’* 

A silence followed, an awkward one. Colthurst broke 
it rather harshly. 

* However well my p-pictures may sell in the future, 
though, I am afraid 1 shall not be able to afford celestial 
vengeance of that description,’ he said. 1 Heaven is 
impeccable, I am afraid, not to be bought. But — oh, well, 
short of that supreme indulgence, money may do a good 
deal for me. I want to go to the East. I want to see 
countries where men still treat each other worse than we 
treat our beasts. I want to see the ultimate possibilities 
of human degradation. I don’t care about savages ; they 
are stupid. 1 should like to see intelligence brought to 
bear on the matter ; and you can only have that under 
the conditions of an old civilization. The inside of a 
Chinese prison might suit me, I think, or the slave- 
market at Bagdad. I want to see Ceylon, too — colossal 
stone Buddhas sitting cross-legged upon the sacred lotus, 
in the dim heart of the tropic forest, the smile of com- 
pleted and absolute impersonality upon their lips/ 


I 


The Wages of Sin. 


1 14 

As Colthurst talked thus his stammer lessened. The 
whole man seemed to expand, to grow taller, darker, 
more absorbed and absorbing. The smile of completed 
impersonality was very far indeed from being present on 
his lips. He shifted Miss Crookenden’s cloak restlessly 
to his other arm. He gazed at her, dominated her, even 
as the geni the fisherman. Again the girl grew shy be- 
fore the strange being she had let loose. 

1 1 am afraid my cloak is in your way/ she said — as 
she felt, rather feebly — during a pause in this astonishing 
Oriental excursion. 

1 N-no, indeed it isn’t the least in my way/ Colthurst 
asserted. 

He waited a minute, looking at the light on the water 
of the canal. The ripples gave back a broken rainbow 
of colour upon a ground of liquid, luminous darkness. 
Colthurst put two fingers inside his turned-down shirt- 
collar, and wrenched it outward. He felt dangerously 
moved and excited. 

* I wonder if one will ever get over this execrably bad 
habit of caressing the idea of an utterly improbable future, 
instead of limiting one’s desires to the possible and the 
present/ he said. 1 These magnificent journeys of mine, 
for instance, lie in an entirely improbable future. A 
future when the general public shall have developed a 
desire for innumerable “ James Colthursts ” — you know 
that hateful way of speaking of a man’s pictures? — to 
hang on the walls of its smug, suburban dining-rooms. 
1 must wai until Hampstead, and Highgate, and Tooting, 
and the^wilds of Clapham Common, and kindred abodes 
of the British Philistine cry aloud for possession of my 
work before I can reasonably hope to see Cingalese 
Buddhas or visit slave markets at Bagdad. And the 
British Philistine will never cry aloud for them. So it is 
a future past praying for.’ 

Colthurst turned to the young lady. The line was cut 
deep across his forehead. His expression was daring 
and humble at once. He tried to laugh, being a little 
ashamed of his own excitement ; but he was not good at 
laughter, somehow. His merriment invariably had an 
infusion of bitterness in it. 


Miss Mary Crookenden. 


n 5 

1 Still, you are right, Miss Crookenden. Even my small 
success is not all dry sand. It will buy me a Cook's 
tourist ticket to Switzerland and Italy. That is some- 
thing, after all.’ — He looked at the broken rainbow on the 
surface of the water again . — * For it is very good to lie 
among the gentians in an Alpine pasture, and see the 
snow-peaks braving the sunshine. Or to sit on a vineyard 
wall, amongst the lizards, till you are baked through to 
the marrow. Or to drink a bottle of sour red wine in 
honour of Bacchus, at a wayside osteria , with the traditional 
“ bush ” above the open door. Or to see a stately matron, 
in faded pink and lilac garments, sitting at the corner of 
a deep, narrow, cut-throat street, the wall behind her ripe 
and rich with the greasy soil of ages, frying snails. Do 
you know that ? It is delicious. The charcoal in the 
brazier gives out a dry, grating crackle, and the half- 
naked, brown-limbed children, with the faces of cherubim 
just descended from heaven, crowd round, staring at the 
flat iron pan of bubbling, hissing, sputtering shells.* 

Mary made a little movement of disgust. 

* Ah ! that goes a step beyond the catholicity of your 
artistic instinct/ Colthurst said, quickly. * Yes, it does 
require a very wide range of sympathy to appreciate the 
aesthetic qualities of snail-frying. B-but I wonder why I 
say all these things to you, Miss Crookenden ! They must 
sound very unconventional, very mad. B-but then I 
wonder why we happened to meet — why you happened 
to come here to-night at all ? I should not have thought 
this sort of show would have been to your taste any 
more — well, any more than the snails.’ 

Mary drew herself up. She did not like the personal 
flavour in this last speech. 

* There are a certain number of hours in the day/ she 
said, coldly. 1 We came here simply to get rid of a few 
of the superfluous ones.’ 

She would have walked on after firing her little shot — 
walked on to rejoin Madame Jacobini. That lady had 
seated herself on a bench at the far end of the, alley. 
Adolphus Carr stood in front of her. She was addressing 
him with much energy. Madame Jacobini could not help 
gesticulating. She found it irresistible to suit the word 

\ Z 


T 1 6 


The Wages of Sin. 


to the action, and the action to the word. Mary looked 
rather longingly in her direction, and took a few steps 
forward. But Colthurst’s voice arrested her. 

‘Miss Crookenden,’ he said, with a singular touch 
of authority, ‘ please don’t play at cheap cynicism. I can’t 
b-believe you have the* smallest right to speak in that 
way — yet.’ 

The girl faced him proudly. She was wholly unaccus- 
tomed to such strictures upon the remarks she elected to 
make. 

‘ Indeed,’ she began. And then something in the man’s 
face, some compelling force he seemed to exercise over 
her, made her check herself. — ‘ I have no right to speak 
so,’ she said, quite gently and gravely. ‘ It was an 
affectation. * It was foolish.' 

Colthurst looked down at the pale, green folds of the 
cloak upon his arm. His neat fingers arranged and re- 
arranged them with quick, deft movements. 

‘ You may retort upon me that you wonder why I came 
..re to-night,’ he said, stammering badly. ‘For if you 
have been good enough to study at any work of mine you 
must know that this theatrical style of public festivity is 
not much in my line. I came here to-night not with any 
intention of juggling with my knowledge of the sadness 
and even hideousness that lie at the base of life. I did 
not come to be amused. I abhor what is called amuse- 
ment. I came on a matter of business. I wanted to find 
a particular type which had struck me. I wanted to fix 
the impression of that type firmly in my mind. It was 
the merest chance I should find it again here. But the 
chance was just worth taking. If I did not find it here, 
I had determined to go to every place of public amuse- 
ment in London, to the Park, the theatres, everywhere, 
until I did find it.’ 

Colthurst paused, raised his head, and looked fixedly 
at Mary Crookenden. There was a demand in that look. 
And Mary met the demand. Unwillingly, reluctantly, 
shrinking under a strong sense of repugnance — still she 
met if. 

‘And have you found what you were searching for 
here — the type, I mean ? ’ she asked. 


Miss Mary Crookenden . 


ii 7 

‘ Yes,’ he said, * I have found it. This evening has been 
a triumph for me in a small way. — I am not among the 
slavish believers in work from the model, you know. The 
model is all very well for the journeyman part of our 
business ; but there are innumerable things you can never 
learn from the model. All the most descriptive and deli- 
cate effects of gesture, many of the most dramatic revela- 
tions of character and emotion, are necessarily evanescent 
and transient. You must seize them in passing if you are 
to seize them at all. Therefore I have trained myself to 
work largely from memory. And so when, as in the case 
we were just speaking of, I see a type that attracts me, 
a face that — that holds an idea for me, action that in- 
terests me, I go after it. I do not let it evade me. I 
have a great deal of patience, but in the end I hunt it 
down. I possess myself of it.’ Colthurst’s handsome 
hands played oddly with the folds of the cloak. * I 
possess myself of it,’ he repeated. * I know every line, 
every curve, every tone. I master it. I learn it by 
heart. It belongs to me. It can’t elude me even if it 
would. It grows obedient. It comes when it is called.’ 

Oh ! this bear danced to horrible tunes ! This geni 
towered up to a height altogether giddy and terrific. Mary 
Crookenden was accustomed to discreet admiration and 
adulation. She was accustomed to rule her little king- 
dom according to her passing fancy. She was accus- 
tomed to being treated with high respect, consideration, 
indulgence; to being petted, humoured, given way to. 
She was accustomed to banish all that disturbed her or 
offended her taste. In her own circle of society she was 
privileged and precious. No one took even her name in 
vain. And now her little kingdom seemed to have dis- 
appeared in chaos. A major force had swept down on it. 
Her privileges were disregarded. Her poor little throne 
was in ruins ; the conventional props and supports of it 
had given way altogether. Her ^courtiers had forsaken 
her. She was all alone, face to face with a personality 
larger, stronger, more unrestrained, more dauntless than 
any she had ever encountered before. She was overcome 
by a panic of nervous fear. 

Had Madame Jacobini and Mr. Carr been within earshot 


1 1 8 


The Usages of Sin. 


she would have called to them. But the bench was vacant ; 
they were no longer in sight. She turned and glanced 
back. Her beautiful eyes were wide with misgiving and 
angry trouble, wet with something — notwithstanding her 
wilfulness and little airs of self-reliant grandeur — sus- 
piciously akin to tears. The child, which lives in every 
true, pure-minded woman till far beyond the age Mary 
Crookenden had reached, gazed out of her face, simple, 
unaffected, terrified even, crying out dumbly but very 
eloquently for comfort, for protection and help. 

Just then it happened that the monster fountain in the 
central basin rushed upward, a vast column of water, 
breaking, falling, dissipating itself in showers of golden 
light which irradiated the whole scene. It bathed the 
girl's fair face and figure as with the outburst of some 
strange sunset. She stood transfigured in the glow of 
soft unearthly light, her lips tremulous, her bright image 
doubled in the water at her feet. 

Lancelot Crookenden and Aldhairi had just loitered down 
the steps from the terrace. 

Colthurst stared at the girl in evident amazement. Then 
he glanced at the splendid young fellow coming lazily 
along the alley. He uttered a sharp exclamation. With 
a turn in the blood, which made him sick and faint for an 
instant, so that his muscles relaxed and the plush cloak 
fell in a heap on the gravel about his feet, he recognized 
them both ; while the outward vision of illuminated exhibi- 
tion gardens, electric lights, elaborate fountains, the hum 
and measured movement of the London crowd — all the 
artificial elements of his actual surroundings — gave place 
to an inward vision of a very different order. — He saw a 
steep heather-clad hill, sweeping upward to the cliff edge, 
the still blue waters of the autumn sea beyond ; and, 
wrapped about with misty sunshine, their shadows lying 
long across the slope, a sturdy, smooth-faced school-boy, 
and a little orange and scarlet-clad maiden, pale-cheeked, 
red-eyed, the sweet evening wind tangling her long fair hair. 

There were other human presences in that vision too ; 
but on them Colthurst struggled not to let his remem- 
brance dwell. Indeed, to him the vision was poignantly 
sad. 


Miss Mary Crookenden. 


119 

To most persons it is doubtfully cheering, I suppose, to 
meet themselves of five, seven, ten years ago. To Colt- 
hurst it was not doubtfully cheering, but quite undoubtedly 
ghastly, so to meet himself ; to look in his own eyes ; to 
hear again his own voice ; to dream again those bound- 
lessly ambitious dreams ; to have again that sense of 
leisure, of plenty of time ahead for fulfilment, which goes 
so far to give youth its enchanting buoyancy of spirit ; to 
feel again that magnificent rage of living which belongs to 
the hopes and apprehensions of three-and-twenty, Ah ! 
if he could but have wiped out those ten intervening 
years ; wiped out not only the griefs and disillusionments, 
but even the ripening of talents, the success and renown 
they had brought him, and be back on that breezy hill- 
side once again ! He was torn with passionate longing, 
passionate regret. But unfortunately the road of life — it is 
a truism — is so constructed that there is no going back. 

1 Oh ! Lance, Lance, I am so glad you have come ! ' 
cried Mary Crookenden. 1 1 want to find Sara Jacobini. 
Will you take me to find her ? I want to go home.' 

She moved close to him, childlike still in look and 
action, holding out her hands. 

1 Of course I’ll take you/ he answered gladly, soothingly. 

Then the goodly youth’s manner suffered a singular 
change. He addressed himself to James Colthurst with a 
studied insolence, of which Mr. Aldham, for one, would 
have thought him wholly incapable. 

* I will trouble you to give me my cousin’s cloak. I see 
you’ve dropped it,’ he said. 

Colthurst stooped mechanically and picked it up. For 
the moment his power of defiance, of self-assertion, was 
gone. 

< I am much obliged to you,' Lancelot went on, curtly. 
* Come, Polly ; which way did they go ? ’ 

As Miss Crookenden walked away her alarm found 
expression in words. They were intended exclusively for 
her companion's ear, but the place was quiet and her 
grave voice carried. 

< What an odious man ! ’ she said. 1 He is insufferable ; 
he has no manners. And it is more than that— he is 
terrible, terrible.' 


20 


The Wages of Sin. 


Lancelot stopped dead in the middle of the path. 

‘ Why, the brute, what has he said ? what has he 
done ? ’ he demanded. 

‘ Nothing — nothing in the world. Oh ! my dear Lance, 
don’t you become terrible too ! ’ cried poor Mary. ‘ Nothing 
in the world. Do come. Let us find Sara Jacobini. He 
is only very extraordinary. Oh ! pray don’t say anything 
more about it. Really he did and said nothing one could 
describe, nothing one could take hold of. It is him, 
himself.’ — Miss Crookenden put her hand through her 
cousin’s arm.— ‘Come along, dear old boy,’ she said. 

‘ It’s all right now I have found you. I am afraid I was 
not quite nice to you just now. Lance, you don’t owe 
me one, do you ? You forgive me ? ’ 

‘Why, yes, of course, Polly,’ the young man said, 
simply. ‘ Of course, I forgive you.’ 

And it appeared to Lancelot that the same sun as of 
old might, after all, rise to-morrow morning. 

Mr. Aldham had stayed behind. He felt it due to him- 
self that if other people lost their heads, he should give 
evident proof that his, at all events, remained quite in its 
right place on his shoulders. The little scene he had just 
witnessed appeared to him as precipitate as it was enig- 
matical. Miss Crookenden’s bearing displeased him. It 
came near being undignified. But that only made him 
the more anxious to cover the abruptness of her retreat. 
He addressed a few civil words to Colthurst, expressing 
a hope that this, though their first, might not prove to be 
their last meeting. But, I am afraid, Mr. Aldham’s attempts 
at cordiality were not calculated to carry conviction. He 
was preoccupied. His thin lips were more than usually 
compressed. 

‘We must arrive at an understanding — yes or no,’ 
he was saying to himself, while he bade Colthurst good 
night. ‘ This state of uncertainty is not desirable for 
either of us. We must come to an understanding. We 
will do so in Switzerland.’ 

At that unnerving moment of recognition,, as Miss 
Crookenden’s cloak fell to the ground, her sketch-book had 
dropped out of the pocket of it. It lay now on the gravel 
at Colthurst’s feet. No one but himself had observed it. 


Miss Mary Crookenden. 


1 21 


He stood looking down at it. Should he call Aldham 
back and give it to him ? That seemed an act of 
humility, an act of service ; and Colthurst was very far 
from inclined towards humility and acts of service just at 
present. Lancelot’s manner, Miss Crookenden’s parting 
words — he had heard them — cut him like a whip. His 
whole nature was in revolt. He was fiercely indignant 
with circumstance, chance, fate — either word does equalty 
well and ill — for the very disconcerting practical joke she 
had played on him. He was indignant, too, with the 
woman who had been fate’s main instrument in the play- 
ing of that joke. Why had she gone out of her way to 
cajole and flatter him ? It was purely gratuitous on her 
part. He had only wanted to stare at her as at some 
beautiful work of art ; and, of its own free-will, the picture 
had walked out of its frame, the statue stepped down from 
its pedestal. Smiling, gracious, altogether head-turning, 
it had approached him. Really it was not his fault, his 
doing. And then all that he most wished to forget had 
risen, spectral, sinister, accusing, behind the gracious 
figure ; while the figure itself turned away, leaving him 
opposite that spectral background — turned away with 
something very like an insult on its lips. 

* Odious, insufferable, mannerless,’ Colthurst repeated to 

himself. * A pretty list of epithets. I may as well claim 
the privileges of my disabilities.’ ^ 

And he stooped down and picked up the sketch-book. 

* It may be worth studying,’ he said. 1 Its contents may 
help to fix my impression of this particular type.' 


122 


The Wages of Sin. 


BOOK III.— ST. M I CH E L-LES-B AI N S. 


‘Tres volontiers,’ repartit le demon. ‘ Vous aimez les tableaux chan- 
geans; je veux vous contenter. , — Le Diable Boiteux. 


Chapter I. 

1 But, my dearest Mary, I assure you it is nothing on earth 
but liver.’ 

The speaker, Madame Jacobini, sat up in her narrow 
wooden bed and delivered herself of this intimate an- 
nouncement with much energy of conviction. Her skin 
was remarkably yellow, and offered a fine contrast to the 
grey woollen shawl thrown over her head. Madame 
Jacobini was one of those women who give themselves 
up to illness with positive generosity. She abandoned 
all artifice. She surrendered at discretion. She knew 
the grey woollen shawl made her look frightful. She did 
not care. Indeed, to look frightful under the circumstances 
was a sort of satisfaction. 

Miss Crookenden, meanwhile, looking very much the 
reverse of frightful — though her beautiful eyes had a 
suggestive redness around them, which also slightly 
invaded her nose and chin — sat on the side of the bed. 
This young lady was never more engaging, I* think, 
than when in a sentimental humour. She contemplated 
her companion with an expression of the most artless 
distress. She sat there the image of delicate despair. 
Niobe, at two-and-twenty, in a particularly neat, dust- 
coloured, beige gown, with a full white silk waistcoat 
to it ! 

1 You know, Sara,’ she said, mournfully, ‘ if you have 
not complete confidence in that little French doctor-— 


St. Michel-les-Bat is. 


123 


he looks dreadfully young, though he is so fat — I will 
telegraph to Baird directly, and tell him to come out.’ 

‘ What insanity ! ’ cried Madame Jacobini. 

‘ He could cross by the night boat, and be here to- 
morrow evening. And I should feel so much easier if he 
saw you.’ 

Miss Crookenden’s breath caught in a really piteous 
way, while she furtively dabbed the small square of 
embroidered cambric she held in one hand against her 
eyes. 

‘ And pray what fee do you suppose Baird would ask 
for stepping out here just to tell me to take blue pill ? ’ 
inquired Madame Jacobini, not without irony. 

‘ Oh ! I’m sure I don’t know. But what does money 
matter, Sara, when health is at stake ? And I haven’t 
been very extravagant this year. And Uncle Kent wrote 
and told me, just before we started — you remember? 
— some more had been paid in. And it wouldn’t be 
possible to spend it better than in securing your comfort, 
Sara, and— and perhaps saving your life.’ — The picture 
conjured up by her last words so overcame Miss Crooken- 
den that she began to cry in good earnest. — ‘ It would 
be too horrible to think we hadn’t done everything 
that we could ; and if anything happened to you what 
should I do ? oh ! what should I do without you ? ’ 

‘But, my precious child — for goodness' sake don’t 
make yourself so unhappy, Mary.’ — Madame Jacobini 
leaned forward, and possessed herself of one of the 
girl's pretty hands. — ‘It is liver, I tell you. Liver, 
liver, liver,’ she repeated, in a rising scale of emphasis. 

‘ Why, this attack is nothing ! In old days I have 
sung at concerts — with Jacobini, poor dear creature, 
conducting too in a state of nervous irritability that was 
simply appalling — when I was so giddy the notes on 
my music sheet hoppecj up and down as if they were 
on wires. Everything turned addled-egg colour. The 
faces of the audience were like an enormous bed of 
autumn cabbages — every conceivable shade of green and 
yellow. And when I went back into the artistes’ room 
I fainted dead away, and frightened the soprano nearly 
into fits. And yet did I die ? ’ she added, with a little 


124 


The Wages of Sin. 


grimace. 1 Not a bit of it. Depend upon it, Mary, we 
skinny scare-crows of women, with big mouths, are un- 
commonly tough. We take a lot of killing/ 

Miss Crookenden could not help smiling. But she did 
so reluctantly. 

i I don’t believe in foreign doctors/ she remarked. 

1 They are so rough. They are not sympathetic, and 
they don’t keep their nails clean — at least M. Baraty 
doesn’t. He may give you all sorts of horrible wrong 
drugs ’ 

1 Because his nails are dirty ? } interrupted Madame 
Jacobini. 

* No, of course not, but ’ 

* But nothing/ interrupted the elder lady again. 1 In 
the long run he will give me just precisely what I tell 
him to give me. Why, that is what every sensible 
person calls in a doctor for — to confirm their own opinion, 
and prescribe the medicine they have a fancy to take. 
I know exactly what is the matter with me. The attack 
has been coming on for the last week. I must have got 
a chill the day we were at Thonon with your aunt and 
what you profanely call the Chosen People. Perhaps, 
dear Mrs. Crookenden’s extreme coolness of demeanour 
gave me a chill — very possibly. Her neighbourhood is 
extremely suggestive of that of a large patent refrigerator. 
I was conscious of feeling quite poorly before the after- 
noon was over. But at the time I put it down to le 
spleen — active irritation induced by the manceuvrings of 
Lady Alicia Winterbotham in respect of poor Lancelot.’ 

Madame Jacobini looked hard at Miss Crookenden as 
she concluded those remarks. But the young lady re- 
mained, to all appearance, entirely indifferent. 

1 Violet Winterbotham is really very nice/ she said. 
1 She has a lovely mouth. She inherits that from her 
mother. All the Quayles have loyely mouths. Even Lady 
Louisa Barking, who is as “ biled crow ” unto me, a dish 
I pre-eminently don’t “ hanker after,” has a lovely mouth.’ 

' Oh ! has she ? ’ exclaimed Madame Jacobini. She 
closed her eyes, and leaned back against the square, 
squashy pillows with a wide smile, followed by a yawn 
of proportional dimensions. ' Has she ? ' she repeated. 


St. Michel-les-Bains. 


There was a silence of some duration. At last Miss 
Crookenden rose from her seat on the side of the bed. 
She shook herself gently, getting her dust-coloured skirts 
into place, stooped down and smoothed the bow on her 
left shoe, which was slightly crumpled. — ' You really 
won’t let me telegraph for Baird, then ? ’ she asked. 

' Good gracious, no ! ' cried Madame Jacobini, opening 
her eyes again. ' Certainly not. In a day or two I shall 
be perfectly well. If it was not for your being alone, I 
believe I should rather enjoy myself here. Bed is a blessed 
refuge. To get this unexpected holiday from dressing, 
and posing, and being agreeable, and making the best of 
oneself generally, as a self-respecting woman must — oh, 
it’s a prodigious relief ! But it really is annoying,’ she 
continued, ' that 1 should be laid up just now, when the 
Frank Lorimers are gone. If Mrs. Frank had been here I 
could have laid in bed with an easy mind. But I don’t in 
the least like your having nobody but Chloe to look after 
you.’ 

' Chloe will look after you, not me, please, Sara. I 
have not the smallest intention of your being left to the 
tender mercies of that harumscarum French chambermaid.’ 

' But you can’t sit in-doors all day, my dear child.' 

' Of course not,’ answered the other. ' I shall go out. 
I shall walk. I shall sketch. I shall be very indepen- 
dent. It will be extremely amusing.’ 

' But, my dear, you can’t go wandering about alone 
here. To begin with you would feel very uncomfortable, 
not having an idea how to take care of yourself. And 
to go on with, we should have half the young men in St. 
Michel-les-Bains dangling after you, with Mr. Aldham at 
their head.’ 

Mary drew herself up. 

‘ Mr. Aldham is not the sort of person who dangles,’ 
she observed, laying a contemptuous stress on the final 
word. 

'No; I must own, I don’t believe he is,’ the elder 
woman responded, quickly. — Her indomitable honesty 
frequently compelled her to eat up her own words thus. 
She closed her eyes again, and folded her thin hands on 
the sheet. — ' I don’t care very ardently about him, you 


1 26 


The Wages 0/ Sin. 


know, Mary. Those very priestly young gentlemen make me 
a trifle nervous. I can hardly believe the greater part of their 
saintliness doesn't take off with their long black coats/ 

' When we saw Mr. Aldham yesterday he was in flan- 
nels/ put in Miss Crookenden. 

' Only part of him. It was an ingenious compromise 
between the world and the Church. Remember that 
hideous stock and the high black waistcoat. The yoke 
was still about his neck/ — Madame Jacobini yawned again. 
— ' No/ she went on ; ' they do seem to me rather un- 
natural. A man should not be too obviously good. It is 
an infringement of our rights, and reverses the proper 
position of men and women. The woman ought always 
to be the better of the two. It appears to me that is just 
what she is made for. And then these young clergymen 
generally end by going over to Rome — they are Jesuits at 
heart, every man Jack of them ! ’ 

' 1 am sure Mr. Aldham is not a Jesuit at heart/ said 
Miss Crookenden. 

'And I have often remarked/ Madame Jacobini con- 
tinued, relentlessly, 'that these super-excellent, saintly 
people, who are always cracking up asceticism and self- 
denial, and who give one the impression they are only fit 
to associate with the angels, and have consequently the 
right to be slightly contemptuous towards us lay wretches 
with all our solicitude over marrying and giving in mar- 
riage, usually end by having not only a wife but an enor- 
mous family themselves/ 

' Really, Sara, I don't think we need go into that/ Mary 
exclaimed. 

A little struggle took place in her between offence and 
affection. She wished Sara would not say what was 
inconvenient. She wished particularly she would not do 
so when she was ill, and it was consequently impossible to 
be comfortably offended with her. It seemed like taking 
an unfair advantage of the situation. — 'If you are sure 
you don't want me, I think I’ll go out for a walk/ she 
said, abruptly. She moved away to the door. 

Madame Jacobini lay watching the girl, shading her 
eyes with one hand. Her bright, plain face wore an 
expression of rather puzzled amusement. 


St. Michel-les-Bains. 


127 


‘ Mary/ she called out suddenly, ‘ 1 am a disgusting 
coward.’ 

Miss Crookenden looked back, her hand on the door 
handle. 

‘ Really ! * she said. ‘ Then you know yourself better 
than I know you.’ 

Madame Jacobini made a little grimace. 

‘ Don’t be angry, my dear ; and come here, please. I want 
to speak to you. I have had something on my mind for the 
last three weeks, and it has helped to make me bilious. I 
knew I ought to admonish you. What do you keep me for, 
except to admonish you now and again ? And I have not 
had the moral courage to speak out and have done with it.’ 

Mary, carrying her head rather high, came slowly back 
across the shining parquet floor, and stood at the bottom 
of the bed. 

‘ If you are going to tell me something disagreeable, 
pray tell it me at once,’ she said, calmly. 

Madame Jacobini laughed a little. 

‘You are inimitable,’ she exclaimed. ‘Yes, it is disa- 
greeable, and we had better get it over as quickly as may 
be. — My dear, then, do you know you are rather cruel to 
that unhappy young Jesuit ? One day you are mild, and 
deferential, full of appropriate enthusiasm, and those 
pretty eyes of yours look unutterable things. The poor 
creature treads on air. Next day you are as proud as 
Lucifer — give him the cold shoulder in the most open and 
ostentatious way. He sinks beneath a sea of lead — or 
would do so if his self-esteem didn’t act cork-jacket and 
keep him afloat. Now, I hold that flirting, in moderation, 
is as natural at one time of life as measles at another. All 
the same I do not think it is quite right to go on first 
blowing hot and then cold, in this way. You know my 
opinion of him. He is altogether too irreproachable for 
my taste. Still, fair play’s a jewel, Mary, and no woman, 
if a man is genuinely in love with her, ought to tease him 
as naughty children do a mouse with a string to its leg ; 
do you think she ought ? ’ 

Miss Crookenden gave a little shudder. 

‘ Was that pity for the mouse or the man ? ’ asked 
Madame Jacobini, quickly. 


128 


The Wages of Sin. 


1 Oh ! the mouse/ the young lady answered. ‘ I wish 
you would not make use of such illustrations, Sara. I 
can’t bear to think of creatures being hurt.’ 

* I don’t dictate ; I don’t even advise ; I only state the 
case/ Madame Jacobini said, spreading out her hands. ‘ If 
you don’t intend to accept him, don’t let him propose. 
With a little honest effort you can easily show him that 
won’t do. If you do intend to accept him, don’t plague 
him. He is not all sweetness and light. He has a long 
memory. He is one of those immaculate persons whom 
it is particularly unwise to irritate.' 

Miss Crookenden’s lofty demeanour had suffered con- 
siderable modification during the progress of this conver- 
sation. She came round to the bed-side, straightened out 
the edge of the sheet, and administered sundry pokes to 
the squashy pillows, bending down meanwhile over her 
friend. * Sara, do you think I have behaved very badly ? ’ 
she asked. 

* I think you had better know your own mind.’ 

* But my mind changes/ said Miss Crookenden, plain- 
tively. 

Madame Jacobini smiled, and patted her cheek. 1 You 
must not let it change, my dear. You can be obstinate 
enough, you know, when you like.’ 

The girl wiped her eyes, laughing rather tremulously. 

* Oh ! hang all the lovers/ she said. * I don’t want 
them. Why, in the name of all that’s tiresome, should 
they want me ? I want to be a delightful little old maid 
like Miss Aldham, and paint great pictures.’ 

* What a logical combination of desires ! ’ cried Madame 
Jacobini. * If you are a delightful little old maid like 
Miss Aldham, most decidedly you will never paint great 
pictures. And if you ever paint great pictures, you will 
very certainly not end as an old maid of Miss Aldham’s 
pattern. Extremes meet, but not extremes of that sort. 
The two things are incompatible. To one or other you 
must wave a long farewell, my dear.’ 

'But you don’t really think you are dangerously ill, 
Sara ? * 

' Good gracious, no ! of course not/ 

Mary wiped her eyes again, hastily. 


St. Michel-les-Bains 


129 


' 1 feel foolish/ she said. ' I will go out for a walk.' 

When Madame Jacobini was alone she shut her eyes, 
while her thin, nervous fingers performed a rapid fantasia 
on the smooth space of the turned-down sheet. 

‘ Dear me/ she said, ' what a hatefully head-achey thing 
it is to do one’s duty ! I wish that good youth was at 
Jericho, high waistcoat, angelic face, and all the rest of it. 
And then, in addition, to-night our poor, devoted Lancelot 
arrives here.' 


Chapter II. 

Behind, like an indented coast-line, running out in cape 
and headland, sweeping back in inlet and bay, the edge of 
the pine woods. Below, at the bottom of the great cup 
formed by the surrounding hills, St. Michel-les-Bains, 
looking from this over-hanging height like a child’s toy 
town set out on a green table-cloth. Peeping over the 
farther rim of the cup, above a range of pink-grey crags, 
like the white-headed frost giants of Scandinavian legend, 
out-lying pinnacles and spires of Mont Blanc. All around, 
the grass of the Alpine pasture splashed with flowers, 
across which flights of swallow-tail butterflies — vigorous, 
broad-winged, triumphant creatures, clothed in splendour 
of iridescent purple and pale gold — chased each other, 
and whirled upward, in wild Bacchic dance or riotous 
courtship, high in mid-air. 

The sun was so hot that Colthurst, lying on the grass, 
could feel exactly where the shifting shadow of the pines 
behind him ended, as the sunshine began to creep up 
towards his knees. He was just pleasantly tired. For the 
last three days he had been tramping through the fine 
country lying south and west of the Rhone Valley. The 
two lads, who acted as guides and carried his and his 
companion’s modest baggage, had disappeared down the 
zig-zag path, bordered by barberry bushes thick with scar- 
let fruit, leading to St. Michel. They shouted, and sang, 
and yodelled as they ran, stumbling down the sharp 

K 


130 


The Wages of Sin. 


descent. Their loud, open-throated music was not 
supremely harmonious, perhaps ; but there was an un- 
tamed gaiety in it, born of strong exertion and the 
freedom and enchantment of these mountain pastures, 
which Colthurst found very inspiring, as it came to him 
on the eager breeze that played upon his face and then 
washed away through the branches of the innumerable 
pine-trees behind him. 

Colthurst was taking a holiday. He had been idle for 
three weeks. This was the first three weeks’ idleness, 
save the dreary, enforced idleness of illness, he had known 
since he was quite a small boy. I do not say his holiday 
had been a period of uninterrupted bliss; but, on the 
whole, pleasures had far exceeded annoyances during the 
course of it. The latter had been petty, the former solid, 
and Colthurst felt well. That small word holds a vast 
amount of meaning for some of us. Colthurst was among 
the unfortunates who have sounded the greatness of its 
meaning. His nerves had grown steady ; his vexatious 
inclination to stammer had, consequently, lessened for the 
time. The rage of living possessed him in all its delicious 
fierceness as lie lay on the warm grass of the green alp, 
among the gentians, and salvias, and queer, tall, toad- 
coloured mountain thistles. His brain was quick with 
thoughts. He had a great determination of words to the 
mouth. In short, Colthurst, according to his own fashion, 
was happy. He was ready to go forward along the road 
of life, not regretfully desperate to go back. 

1 Don’t talk to me about beauty as if it was a thing by 
itself, a quantity measurable, ponderable, producible or 
removable at will,’ he was saying, ‘ as if it could be laid 
on, as a cabinet-maker lays on a veneer of precious wood 
over a plain deal surface; as if it could be bought and 
sold, taken hold of, carried about ; as if you could put 
your finger on it and say, Here it is ; or on the absence 
of it, and say, Here it is not. That is a horribly gross, 
carnal conception of it. Beauty is a spirit, and they that 
worship it must worship it in spirit and in truth — specially 
in truth, not in shams, and delusions, and pretences, and 
fashions, and affectations, which are precisely that in 
which the majority always have worshipped it, and always 


St. Michel-les-Bains. 


131 

will worship it, I suppose, human nature being what it is, 
protest as one may. Beauty is the same yesterday, to-day, 
and for ever; and yet it is always changing, shifting, 
showing you a fresh face, revealing itself anew. It is 
endlessly stable and endlessly fertile. It informs all things, 
and yet, in a sense, is nothing. You apprehend it more 
with your intellect than with your eyes. And that is what 
English people persistently refuse to understand. They 
are ruining their stage, as they have already ruined their 
picture-galleries, by the besotted belief that intellect has 
nothing to do with it ; that beauty — which is only another 
word for art — begins and ends with an appeal to the eyes. 
We English plume ourselves on our respectability and 
decency, on avoiding the quagmire of sensuousness into 
which other nations fall. Only look at the walls of our 
exhibitions, look at the mise-en-scene of our theatres ! I 
declare I believe we are the most sensuous nation on the 
face of the earth. The appeal is always to the eye, and 
to what are called the domestic affections. And the 
domestic affections are the biggest shams out. Legalized 
sensuousness — that is what the domestic affections amount 
to if you run them to earth.’ 

Colthurst delivered himself of this tirade with much 
vehemence, leaning on his elbow, pulling now and again, 
in a neatly violent sort of way, at some long jointed 
grasses growing near him — biting at the white, soft 
stems when he had wrenched them from their envelope, 
and then flinging away the feathery heads of flower. 

Mr. Barwell, assistant-master of the Connop Trust Art 
School, sitting beside him — his spare, Don Quixote-like 
frame doubled together, his hands clasped about his knees 
— listened in silent wonder. He was conscious of receiving 
a series of small electric shocks during the course of the 
conversation of which the above is a fragment. Ever 
since he had first encountered James Colthurst, at the 
hotel at Aigle, about a week ago, a sense of almost reck- 
less adventure had been upon him. He had lived in a 
condition of repressed excitement, which, in combination 
with the flies — they abound in the Rhone Valley — had 
seriously broken his rest of a night. This estimable man, 
of over fifty, was as fluttered, as anxiously, doubtfully 

k 2 


132 


The Wages of Sin. 


jubilant, as a small schoolboy out of bounds, at finding 
himself in the company of the rising painter. 

Mr. Barwell had a tall narrow head, with no particular 
back to it ; a nose which his friends and he himself called 
aquiline, but which his enemies — had he possessed any, 
which I cannot believe he did, being the most invincibly 
inoffensive of men — would probably have likened to the 
beak of the parrot rather than that of the eagle ; and a 
large amount of sparse, wavy, grey- white whisker. It 
may be added that he belonged to that charming order of 
persons — to be found, let it be said, to the honour of 
humanity, in all departments of art — who, with admirable 
self-abnegation, are willing to play not second, but twenty- 
second fiddle, if needs be, to their more illustrious brother 
artists all their lives long — the John Baptists of every-day 
life, for ever pointing the crowd to one greater than them- 
selves, whose way they prepare without a trace of envy. 

Mr. Barwell had an unlimited reverence for genius. It 
awed and, in a sense, intoxicated him. Genius might 
exhibit itself under many different forms. Between these 
forms he did not aspire to discriminate, with any rash 
placing of higher and lower, on the strength of his own 
private judgment. He had, of course, heard James Colt- 
hurst’s work much discussed, during the last few months, 
by people interested in artistic questions. He had even 
had the privilege of hearing the well-known Royal Acade- 
mician who presided over the Connop Trust School deliver 
judgment on the subject. 

* He is an innovator,’ that gentleman had said, 1 and 
regards many of our cherished traditions very irreverently. 
I consider his principles, so far as I can pretend to appre- 
hend them, as erroneous, distinctly erroneous. But he is 
clever, undeniably — I had almost said diabolically clever.’ 
And the great man had ended up with a laugh, half apolo- 
getic, half patronizing. 

This speech had recurred frequently to Mr. Barwell’s 
mind during the past week. Erroneous in principle, yet 
diabolically clever. — It appeared to him his chef had hit 
off Colthurst exactly. This delighted him. It gave him 
another opportunity of bowing down before the greatness 
of the said chef It also gave him a convenient phrase 


St. Michel-les-Bains. 


133 


behind which to shelter when Colthurst’s talk alarmed 
him by the agitating reforms it proposed, or the exhaust- 
ingly wide horizons it opened out. Mr. Barwell fortified 
himself with the remembrance that his principles were 
erroneous, and therefore what he said really did not very 
much matter. When the magnetism of Colthurst’s strong 
personality, his force and ability, took him by storm and 
absolutely prostrated him with admiration, he consoled 
himself for his apparent weakness by remembering that 
his own particular Royal Academician, the head of his 
beloved Connop Trust School, had, after all, admitted that 
this iconoclastic young painter was diabolically clever. 
The phrase was a support to him now, as he sat on the 
fragrant grass of the green alp, watching the darting 
butterflies. Again, it proved a most convenient shelter. 
He ran in behind it, and took breath, so to speak, when- 
ever a pause occurred in the cannonade of Colthurst’s 
conversation. 

The cannonade began again very soon, however, break- 
ing out in rather a new place. 

i Beauty lies far deeper than most people are willing to 
suppose. It consists in the true relation of things to 
themselves. Everything natural is beautiful.’ 

‘ Oh, dear ! oh, dear ! ’ murmured Mr. Barwell, mildly, 
under his breath. 

He clasped his knees still tighter with his hands ; and, 
by raising his feet tip-toe and then dropping his heels to 
the ground again, communicated a gentle see-saw motion 
to his doubled up person. He really had to let off steam 
somehow. 

‘ Yes, it is,’ Colthurst asserted. 1 Every action, ex- 
pression, aspect, rightly understood, is beautiful, in as far 
as it is spontaneous and accsrding to nature. And by that 
I don’t only mean nature groomed, and rubbed down, and 
in magnificent condition, like a prize animal at a show. 
I am not going back to any mythic golden age for my 
beauty — not to impossible gods and goddesses in marble.’ 

< You acknowledge the antique as the basis of instruc- 
tion, surely ? ’ gasped Mr. Barwell. 

* No, not as the basis — most emphatically not as the 
basis. That is getting hold of quite the wrong end of the 


134 


The Wages of Sin. 


stick. Work towards perfection, if you like — if you can 
— if perfection exists. But to begin with it and work 
back from it is a self-evident mistake, I should say, con- 
trary to all known laws of development. By setting your 
students down opposite to those faultless marble impossi- 
bilities you create a false standard in their minds. Nature 
does not come up to that standard ; consequently, when 
you show them nature, they despise her. Le mieux est 
Vennemi du bien. Nature is the good ; it is an impiety, as 
well as a stupidity, to discredit her by filling your students’ 
minds with dreams of a non-existent better. The very 
best life model, you can get looks defective after the 
Apollos, and Venuses, and all those other ill-conducted 
classic divinities whom it is customary to make such free 
use of in the education of English }^outh. The final 
measure must always be Nature. Why not send your 
students to her at once ? Why use lies, in short, as a 
preface to the truth ? And why be afraid to take the truth 
as a whole ? — I find Nature is full of imperfection, failure, 
pain, of irony, and of humour of a very broad literal kind. 

* Well, I accept her unhappy and malign aspects as just 
as true as her happy and benign ones. After a tremendous 
struggle, we have come to understand, thanks chiefly to 
Turner and Constable — some of the younger men are 
beginning already to forget or ignore the lesson, though, 
I am afraid — that rain, and storm, and cloud are at least 
as beautiful as clear sky and sunshine, the elements at 
war as beautiful as the elements at peace. Well, I want 
to carry that understanding farther and deeper. I want 
to show that, if intelligently looked at, poverty, disease, 
sorrow, decay, death, sin — yes, I am not much afraid of 
the word — are ideally beautiful too, paintable too, intrin- 
sically and enduringly poetic.’ 

Mr. Barwell see-sawed in a kind of mild desperation 
He was terrified and yet fascinated. 

' Oh, dear ! oh, dear ! ’ he said again ; * but this is 
revolutionary, Mr. Colthurst. Where would not such views 
lead to ? They are revolutionary, positively revolutionary.’ 

Colthurst threw away a bitten grass stem, pushed his 
moustache up from his lip, while a curiously fanatical 
gleam came into his eyes. 


St. Michel-les-Bains. 


135 


'And why not?’ he asked. 'Has it never occurred 
to you what a lovely thing revolution is — La Revolution — 
she, the person, the spirit, the beast, perhaps — I am not 
sure which — who wipes off the dust, and makes the rusty 
wheels turn again, and sweeps away dead ideas, and brings 
forth living ones; that persistent enemy of stagnation, 
without whose broom and dust-pan human affairs would 
be smothered by refuse and cobwebs and eaten out by 
dry-rot ? I don't paint allegorical pictures, you know ; 
but if I were ever deluded enough to attempt one, I 
would try to put Revolution worthily on canvas, in her 
blood-red robe, holding a scourge in her hand. She is a 
divinity much more to my taste than smirking, marble 
Apollos, or even Raffaelesque Madonnas, dressed, parrot- 
like, in half the colours of the rainbow.' 

The assistant master of the Connop Trust School could 
not help it, he groaned as he sat in the shadow of the 
pines, among the gentians, and salvias, and swallow-tail 
butterflies. Faust, before his transformation, must have 
suffered just such very upsetting moments whilst listening 
to Mephistopheles' surprising suggestions in the philoso- 
phy of life. Had he not, indeed, possessed the Royal 
Academician's consolatory phrase to shelter behind during 
the pauses, I fear the good man would hardly have been 
able to retain any degree of mental or moral equilibrium 
at all. 

Humour, fortunately, entirely refuses to run in couples 
with tail-talk. The groan amused Colthurst, and his sense 
of the slight absurdity of the situation steadied him. 
Deference and admiration were new and very pleasant to 
him, particularly when they came from men older than 
himself. The lionizing to which certain circles of society 
had subjected him during the past three months had been 
far from agreeable to him. But for your lionship to be 
attended by one faithful and profoundly impressed jackal 
is a totally different thing from your lionship being stared 
at by a crowd of the professional sight-seers of whom 
society is so largely composed. Colthurst liked his jackal 
— was flattered, touched even, by the creature’s attentions. 
He would have regretted extremely driving it away by the 
loudness of his roaring — though, I am afraid, he dearly 


liked roaring too, and that loudly. He took up his parable 
again, therefore, in an altogether humbler and less aggres- 
sive strain. 

1 It is all very well for me to talk about Revolution/ he 
said ; * but I shall never make one. That is emphatically 
a game it takes two to play at — a public to listen and 
follow, as well as leaders to show the way. In the present 
case there is no public ready to listen — except for a 
minute or two, out of passing curiosity — still less ready 
to follow. The public only listens willingly to those who 
prophesy smooth things, who coax and cosset it, and 
assure it that its worship of the domestic affections is the 
last word of ethics, and religion, and art. The very last 
hing the public desires is to be asked to use its brains, 
or to have the stability of its favourite idols called in 
question. It is the fashion to look at my pictures just 
now ; so the public pays its shilling and goes and looks 
at them. But what does it make of them ? Nothing. 
Empty it comes. Empty it goes away/ 

Colthurst raised himself into a sitting position, resting 
his hands on the grass on either side of him. 

1 Oh ! it is sickening/ he exclaimed. ‘ Sometimes it 
makes me laugh, sometimes it makes me mad, when I 
♦ think how miserably little my pictures mean to other 
people, as compared with what they mean to me/ 

* No doubt/ Mr. Barwell said, relieved at being able to 

agree for once. 1 But that I suppose is the fate of every 
artist, in a degree. And yet I think you rather under- 
estimate the intelligence of the public, Mr. Colthurst, if 
you will pardon my saying so. In regard to “ The Road 
to Ruin,” for instance, I don’t say the public has grasped 
your meaning to the full, still ’ 

* “ The Road to Ruin ” ! ’ Colthurst broke in, glancing 
sharply, suspiciously at his companion. —But the expression 
of that gentleman’s countenance was guileless, civil, en- 
tirely sincere. — ‘You are quite r-right/ he went on, 
stammering badly all of a sudden, whispering his words 
quickly to get them said at all. ‘ The p-public, even allow- 
ing hat I under-estimate its intelligence, certainly has not 
grasped all my meaning. It would have been consider- 
ably astonished and frightened if it had. The p-picture 


St. Michel-les-Bains. 


137 





meant very much to me. It meant nothing less than 
salvation or d-damnation. First one, then the other. 


Now it m-means — why — good Lord ! ■' 

Colthurst sprang to his feet with — so it seemed to much- 
perturbed Mr. Barwell — a kind of silent black flash, and 
then stood curiously still. 

Out of the pine-wood on the left comes the bridle-path 
leading down to St. Michel-les-Bains. For a couple of 
hundred yards it skirts the edge of the pasture, and then 
turns abruptly down over the hill-side, among the barberry 
bushes. Along this path came Miss Crookenden and 
Cyprian Aldham. They were talking, talking too earnestly 
to be sensible of the presence of the two spectators on 
the other side of the pasture, in the shadow of the pines. 
Half-way along the path Mary Crookenden stopped, and 
stood holding her hat on with one hand, her graceful 
figure — outlined against the vast panorama of distant hill- 
side, mountain, and crag — distinct and bright in the strong 
sunshine. Aldham — Colthurst knew him again, notwith- 
standing his flannels — waited beside her. He was talking 
still. Apparently what he said did not quite meet with 
Miss Crookenden's approval. She turned away, and walked 
on along the path. Then at the top of the hill it would 
seem she repented. She paused among the scarlet-fruited, 
barberry bushes, making a pretty picture in her light gown 
and big white hat. Aldham rejoined her. Together they 
disappeared down the steep descent. 

Colthurst’ s hand had clutched at something in the breast 
pocket of his jacket. He kept it there as he sat down on 
the grass again. 

1 That young lady and gentleman are spending a very 
agreeable morning, I fancy/ Mr. Barwell remarked, with 
a touch of gentle irony. 

The good man liked to see lovers. He affected to smile 
at their follies. He really envied them their follies not a 
little. Two lean, high-nosed Miss Barwells, in a small 
semi-detached villa at Hampstead, whose united incomes 
did not exceed seventy pounds a year, had rendered, and 
would continue to render, love and marriage impossible 
for him. So Mr. Barwell contented himself with the 
labours of the Connop Trust School, and admiration of 


the works and ways of his own particular Royal Acade- 
mician He civilly but firmly, these many years, had 
requested sentiment to keep her distance. But sentiment 
was not always as obligingly obedient as she might have 
been. On the present occasion she gave a drag at the 
excellent under-master’s heart-strings, which caused him 
more than one twinge of delicate pain. And somehow 
those twinges of pain made him regain his self-possession. 
Colthurst’s strange, violent personality ceased to dominate 
him. Mr. Barwell made a return upon himself. He 
voluntarily took off the distorting, exaggerating, monster- 
revealing spectacles through which the younger man had 
insisted upon his looking at the universe ; and regarded it 
once more, just simply and naturally, with his own kindly, 
modest eyes — eyes focussed to see the good and be dim to 
the evil ; focussed to accept anomalies ; focussed not to 
peer too deep or perceive too clearly, or range in vision 
too far. It is no mean happiness to be seated in the mean, 
says the maxim. All excess brings sorrow and disaster; 
even excess of talent, even excess of truth itself. 

And yet I venture to doubt whether Mr. Barwell’s return 
upon himself was voluntary, after all ; whether Colthurst 
had not unconsciously withdrawn his influence, rather 
than Mr. Barwell consciously emancipated himself from 
that influence. 

1 Now it m-means b-both,’ Colthurst repeated to himself, 
finishing off his broken sentence, his eyes fixed on the 
spot where the path turns so abruptly down over the hill- 
side — 4 both, both — as you look at it from one side or the 
other, heaven or hell.’ He put his fingers inside his shirt- 
collar, and wrenched it outward. — * Don’t you think it is 
about time we went on to St. Michel, and got some food,’ 
he asked, 4 and found out what those shouting boys have 
done with our luggage ? ’ 


Chapter III. 

Miss Crookenden came in very late for luncheon. At the 
stair-head of the Hotel et Pension Chabaud the statuesque 
coloured woman, her dusky, splay-featured countenance 
sharpened by anxiety, stood waiting to receive her. 


St. Michel-les-Bains. 


139 


1 De Lord be praised for de sight of you, Miss Mary, 
darlin ’ ! } she broke out, volubly. 1 Where you bin gone 
dis long time all alone ? Poor Auntie Chloe's looked out 
of de window, up de street and down de street, till her ole 
eyes were smarting with watching for you/ 

1 Oh, I lost my way, and have wandered out of the old 
world into a new one since I left you this morning/ Miss 
Crookenden answered, pulling off her hat and gloves and 
giving them to her nurse. ‘ I had no end of bother in 
finding my way home again/ — The girl's smile was rather 
wan. She went languidly along the wide passage and into 
her own room. She sat down on the nearest chair. — ( In 
fact, I'm not quite sure I have found my way home even 
now. Take off my boots, auntie, if you love me, this very 
minute. How’s Madame Jacobini ? ' 

1 Oh, she’s doin’ well enough ! ’ 

The ex-slave’s allegiance to her young mistress’s duenna 
was of a mitigated and intermittent description. She 
possessed the high respect for social standing common to 
her race. ‘Ma’am Jacobini only a music-teacher,’ she 
would mumble to herself with a fine flavour of contempt, 
whenever that lady happened to displease her, or when — 
as on the present occasion — Miss Grookenden’s affectionate 
solicitude aroused her jealousy. Now, as she squatted on 
the floor, unlacing the girl’s boots, she grumbled out — 

‘ I'm thinking Ma’am Jacobini ’ll be 'bliged to find servants 
of her own to tend her if she’s gwine to keep her bed. 
Chloe’s not gwine to ’low de chile she loves better’n any- 
thing else in de length and breadth of dis sinful ole earth 
to go wandering around alone, and coming in looking as 
white as de snow on de top of de mountains. You’ve 
just bin and tired yourself to death, honey.’ 

Miss Crookenden leaned back in her chair, her hands 
hanging by her sides, her pretty feet reposing in the old 
woman’s lap, and answered in the same tone of rather 
melancholy playfulness — 1 You see it is a very long jour- 
ney from one world to another between ten o’clock and 
two, auntie. I am bound to be tired after it, and to feel 
a little limp. But I shall not take such a journey again 
for seven whole months,’ she added. * Think of that, 
auntie — not for seven whole months/ 


140 


The Wages of Sin. 


* De chile’s light-headed/ murmured the old woman, 
peering up over the rim of her spectacles. 

4 No, the child is only a little heavy-hearted. My 
patience, me, Chloe/ cried Miss Crookenden, with a sudden 
revival of animation, ‘what a monstrously troublesome 
world it is ! ' 

Chloe's patient, animal-like eyes gazed up in doting, 
questioning fondness. Then she fell to rubbing the soles 
of the girl’s feet as she held them in her large brown 
hands. 

4 It oftens ’pears to me,’ she said, musingly, 4 de best 
prayer for all of us, de young as well as de aged, is for 
de Lord to please to make up de number of His elect and 
hasten His coming. Dat’s de only sartin cure for de 
troubles of dis yeah world, Miss Mary, darling. I ’low 
de judgment-day ’ll be de brightest day dat ever dawned 
for a mighty ’mount of folks down yea$.' — The rubbing 
ceased abruptly . — 4 Why, if der isn’t a little hole in de toe 
of your stocking, honey ! ' 

4 There must be holes in somebody’s stockings,’ Miss 
Crookenden rejoined, in a tone of somewhat discouraged 
philosophy. 

‘ But not in yours,’ the old woman said, with decision. 

‘ Let Chloe put you on another pair, and get you your 
white silk wrapper, and you lie down on de sofa and 
eat de leastes little bit of chicken, and go to sleep till 
tea-time.' 

These suggestions were not, it must be owned, wholly 
unattractive to the young lady. The 1 leastes little bit of 
chicken,' followed by slumber, appealed to her as a more 
feasible and less agitating remedy for her present ex- 
haustion than its apparent alternative — a hurrying on of 
the Day of Judgment. 

‘ But Madame Jacobini ? 9 she said. 

4 Never you trouble about her. She's doin’ well enough. 
De doctor said she was to be kep’ quiet.’ 

The old woman spoke crossly. It was evident that 
she, anyhow, entertained no fears regarding the invalid's 
eventual restoration to her usual health and vivacity. 

The Hotel et Pension Chabaud must have formerly 
been a country house of considerable pretensions. It 


St. Michel-les-Ba ins . 


41 


stands in a large garden on the outskirts of the pretty, 
warm, yellow-and-white Savoy town. Tradition, indeed, 
reports that it has the honour of occupying the site 
of a Roman villa. For, notwithstanding its distinctly 
Christian name, St. Michel-les-Bains has an aroma of 
classic antiquity hanging about it. It possesses a Roman 
arch, a good deal the worse for wear, as any one visiting 
the public park can testify. An ambitious local archaeo- 
logist is under the glad impression, moreover, that he 
has discovered traces of a temple, probably of Mercury, 
in the stable-yard of M. Garin, diligence proprietor. While 
the indications of Roman baths are so incontestable, that 
the visitors to the Etablissement Thermal , when standing 
mournfully before their tall glasses of really terrible 
mineral water, may support themselves with the thought 
that they are not alone in their misery. Gentlemen in 
togas, and ladies in flowing robes and sandals, nearly 
two thousand years ago, stood dismally as they are stand- 
ing, hesitated, gulped, retched, even as they do ; and no 
doubt agreed that this liquid horror must be extremely 
efficacious, since it is so unspeakably nasty. 

Miss Crookenden’s sleep did her good. At five o’clock 
she had a little tea-party under a large mulberry-tree in 
the garden aforesaid. It was really hot. Caterpillars let 
themselves down by silken threads into the milk-jug, and 
wasps invaded the honey-pot. Yet the tea-party was 
pleasant. Lancelot Crookenden had arrived. His cousin 
was, perhaps, a little surprised at her own gladness at his 
advent. 

He drove up in a small one-horse carriage, of dimen- 
sions distinctly inadequate to the length of his legs, side 
by side with Simond Caillet, the guide — the latter smoking 
a long black pipe with imperturbable composure and 
holding a couple of ice-axes across his knees. 

St. Michel is not much in touch with the more serious 
side of Alpine experience. The arrival of this handsome 
young Englishman, just back, so said the gossips, from a 
series of grandes ascensions , threw' the hotel into a flutter 
of excitement. The concierge let down the steps of the 
little carriage with a flourish, as though receiving royalty. 
Madame Chabaud herself, neat, plump, active, outwardly 


The Wages of Sin. 


142 

soft as silk, inwardly— -save where the three-year-old son 
and heir of the house of Chabaud was concerned — harder 
than the nether millstone, appeared in the doorway, head- 
ing a numerous contingent of servants. A German-Swiss 
family, large alike in numbers and in personal proportions, 
leaned out over a balcony on the first floor to see the 
show. A shrill- voiced American child called out to its 
faded-looking mother, ' Oh, my, mammah ! ain’t his face a 
colour 1 ’ in perfectly audible accents. And some English 
girls, in ill-fitting ' shirts ’ and short petticoats, stopped in 
the middle of their game of lawn-tennis with the mystic 
words 'Two, love,’ on their lips. St. Michel did not pro- 
duce many lawn-tennis-playing young men. They saw 
at a glance this young man must play lawn-tennis mag- 
nificently. But would he play it with them ? Hope springs 
eternal in the human breast. Perhaps he might. They 
darted and skipped over the coarse sun-scorched grass on 
either side the net with renewed vigour. 

Miss Crookenden was in a slightly sentimental humour. 
She lent herself graciously to the enthusiasm of the 
moment. And then it was undeniable that Lancelot looked 
very gallant in his slouched hat and rough mountaineering 
garments, fumbling in his pockets for a most unnecessary 
amount of coin — he had a natural instinct for over-paying 
— as he stood beside the little carriage. 

'Good-bye, Simond,’ he said to the guide. 'Take good 
care of yourself till I come back again. Give my kind 
regards to your wife and those jolly children when you 
get home. I am awfully sorry this is our only job together 
for this season.’ — He took off his hat with a politeness 
which moved even the nether-millstone heart of Madame 
Chabaud. She felt such a young gentleman would confer 
splendour on her establishment. She thanked Heaven 
he had not gone to the Hotel des Comtes de Savoie, in 
the market-place. It would have poisoned her with envy. 
— 'I believe you expect me,’ he said. 'My name’s 
Crookenden. I believe some ladies who are staying here 
have kindly engaged a room for me.’ 

And then all Lancelot’s soul leapt into his quiet eyes, 
for over the landlady’s plump shoulders, farther back in 
the dimness of the hall, he perceived Mary Crookenden, 


St. Michel-les-Bains. 


*43 


wonderfully fair and distinct, stately even, it seemed to 
him, among this common-place company. 

‘ Yes, everything is settled, Lance,' the young lady said. 
‘ Madame Chabaud knows ; don't you, Madame Chabaud ? ' 

1 Parfaitement , mam' selle.' Then, sharply, — ' Pierre , 

montez les bagages de monsieur au numero vingt-deux.' 

‘ It's awfully good of you, Polly, to come and meet me,' 
Lancelot said. He followed his cousin out into the garden. 

* How could I help coming to claim relationship with 
my illustrious cousin before all the admiring throng ? It’s 
not every day we have a chance of welcoming a hero, you 
know, Lance, in our family. Come over there into the 
shade. Chloe has ordered tea for us — out of doors, under 
a tree, for a treat, as if we were two good little children 
in pinafores.’ 

To Lancelot’s ears his cousin’s gaiety did not ring quite 
true. Now he saw her in the light, it struck him she was 
not looking well. She was ‘all eyes,' as the nursery 
phrase runs. 

‘ Mon Dieu , quel adorable jeune homme ! ’ murmured a 
French lady of an emotional order of mind, as the cousins 
passed the rustic seat on which she reposed, supported 
by a wicked-looking black poodle and yellow-covered 
novel. 1 II ressemble a ces amours de gladiateurs qm 
s'egorgent les uns les autres dans le grand tableau de Leon 
Veyrier y au Salon. 1 

The English girls also made their comment. — ‘ Oh ! he 
belongs to her, then ! ' laying great stress on the second 
pronoun. They began to handle their racquets in a 
dispirited fashion. However well the new-comer might 
play lawn-tennis, they entertained a sad conviction he was 
not at all likely to play it with them on the present 
occasion. 

< IVe had a spj did trip,’ Lancelot said, as he munched 
the crisp rolls. ‘ What an awfully nice mulberry-tree ! 
It's like an enormous umbrella. Do you often have your 
tea out here, like this, Polly ? — I wish I could have come 
for longer, but my mother made rather a worry, don’t you 
know, of my going away from Thonon at all. She said it 
broke up the party. But, you know, between ourselves, it 
was rather slow at Thonon. There was literally nothing 


The Wages of Sin. 


H4 

to do. And really they were such a pack of women. I 
don't want to be rude, but there were — three, four, six 
of them — to Winterbotham and me. And that is a little 
severe, you know.’ 

*1 think Violet Winterbotham very pretty/ said Miss 
Crookenden, with a certain decision. 

* Oh ! I dare say. Everybody says so, and so of course 
she must be. There’s a fly in your tea-cup ; let me fish 
him out, Polly. I’m so sorry Madame Jacobini’s seedy. 
Is Aldham still here ? ’ 

1 He goes to-morrow/ Miss Crookenden said, bending 
her head to watch the fly slowly cleaning off drops of 
sugary tea as it staggered over the table-cloth. 4 Tell 
me some more about your mountaineering, Lance.’ 

1 Oh, it was first-rate ! ’ he replied. — It may be noted, 
in passing, that the news of his friend, Cyprian Aldham’s 
impending departure by no means depressed Lancelot. 
He bore up under it remarkably well. — 4 I wish I could 
take you up a big mountain some day, Polly/ he went 
on. * You would like it. You’d make a lot out of it. It’s 
too splendid up there, with the miles of ice and snow, and 
the shifting cloud. The air makes you feel as if you’d 
had a bottle of champagne. And yet somehow, it all 
makes you feel awfully religious too. It’s all so big, and 
solemn, and strong, you know.’ 

Lancelot held out his hand for another roll. Mary gave 
him one. He didn’t know when he had tasted such 
delicious rolls. He didn’t know when he had been in 
such excellent spirits. A tea-party under the dappled 
shade of a mulberry-tree was an invention little short of 
celestial. Lancelot beamed. 

4 I believe I should be a wonderfully good fellow if I 
could do a big mountain about once a month/ he remarked 
between the mouthfuls. 

4 1 think you are a wonderfully good fellow as it is, 
Lance/ Miss Crookenden said, very gently. 

Lancelot’s hand, roll and all, stopped half-way to his 
mouth. 4 Polly/ he began, with a sort of quiet desperation. 
But Miss Crookenden was absorbed in the fly again. 

‘ There, he’s cleaned his wings/ she said — ‘has quite 
unglued them. He’s wiping his face with his fore-legs in 


St Michel-les-Bains. 


H5 

the most fascinating way now. He can turn his head 
right round, Lance, as if it was on a pivot, and look down 
his own back. Don’t you wish you could look down your 
own back ? * 

Miss Crookenden glanced at the young man without 
raising her head. Her expression was as gentle as her 
voice had been a minute ago, when she told him he was a 
wonderfully good fellow. She smiled at him. Her smile 
was full of kindness, of very sincere affection. All the 
same it was a smile preaching restraint rather than 
encouragement. 

‘ Dear old boy, have some more tea ? ' she said ; ( and 
go on telling me about your mountains. I like to hear 
about your mountains — though I am always rather nervous 
about you. You are careful, Lance ? You’re not rash ? ’ 

1 Oh, no ! I’m not rash.’ — Lancelot held his head high 
for a minute. He wanted to get the better of a certain 
shaking of the solid ground of his innermost self — so to 
speak. Then he drank his third cup of tea. A good 
general does not despise details. The minor means, after 
all, generally make or mar success. Lancelot’s supreme 
desire was not to annoy his cousin. He would under- 
stand and obey her, even if it were to his own hindrance. 
It is seldom, I fancy, that any human being thus really 
and practically loves nother better than himself. 

* Look here, Polly, ’ he said, presently : 1 I've just remem- 
bered I got something for you as we were going up 
yesterday morning. It was growing in a little corner of 
black rock, above a big snow field, just at the beginning 
of the arete. It was rather a nasty place, with a sort of 
absence of things in general on both sides of you, which 
made you rather wonder, just at first, why on earth you’d 
ever been such a fool as to come. It seemed rather queer 
to find a flower so far up. Nice and brave of the little 
chap to grow there all alone, and do his level best to make 
things cheerful ; don’t you think so ? ' 

Lancelot opened his silver cigar-case, and took out of 
it a tiny plant of soldanella alpina , with fringed purple 
flower-bells and round green leaves. 

1 Ah ! what a little darling ! ' cried Miss Crookenden. 
She stooped down and looked at it closely as it lay in 


146 


The Wages of Sin. • 


his open hand. The blonde head and the black one were 
very near together just then. The girl’s pale cheek almost 
touched the young man’s sunburnt one — or would have 
touched it had not Lancelot drawn back quickly. The 
western sun streamed in under the spreading branches of 
the mulberry-tree, and lit up Mary’s hair as she leant for- 
ward, turning it into a maze of dusky gold. 

' Do you like it ? ’ 

1 Of course I like it. But what became of the beloved 
cigars ? ’ 

* 1 don’t remember. I suppose I threw them away, or 
Caillet had them. There — take your flower, Polly. I’m 
so glad you think it pretty. But I wish there had been 
something better to bring you. I wish I was a clever 
fellow, and then I could put all I saw into words, and 
please you that way, but ’ 

1 Dear Lance, you couldn’t please me more than you 
do,’ Miss Crookenden said, rather hurriedly. 

She looked up, smiling. 

1 Voila Satan qui entre dans le paradis 1 ’ the emotional 
French lady murmured just then. From her station on 
the rustic bench she had watched the progress of the 
little tea-party with the deepest interest. As she spoke 
the poodle curled up his lips, showing all his white teeth 
in a vicious flash. The voices of the English girls came 
plaintively from the tennis-court, accompanied by the dull 
smack, smack of the racquets against the flannel-covered 
balls . — 1 Two, love — three, love — fault ! No, it wasn't ! 
Yes, it was out of court ! Three, love — fault ! ’ they cried. 

And Mary Crookenden looked up smiling — looked up to 
see Colthurst’s dark figure coming quickly towards her, 
past the tennis-court, past the Frenchwoman and the 
grinning poodle, past a bed of rather starved crimson 
begonias, his shadow lying like a long ink-blot on the sun- 
scorched grass before him as he moved. 

Miss Crookenden ceased to smile. She drew herself up 
haughtily. Lancelot, remarking the change in her, turned 
his head. 

* Great Scott l ’ he said, under his breath, and his fingers 
closed hard on the plant of soldanella, sadly bruising its 
fairy bells. 


St. Michel-les-Bains. 


H7 


He rose to his feet, pushing aside his chair, and waited, 
towering above the tea-table, largely, if silently, on the 
defensive. Mary was behind the table, on the side away 
from Colthurst. He was glad of that. He could see she 
was extremely annoyed. He was glad of that too. 

She looked very straight at the new-comer, as if de- 
manding an explanation of his presence. It would have 
been difficult to offer a more discouraging reception than 
was offered by these two charming young people just 
then. Colthurst perceived that clearly, yet he came on 
into the dappled shade of the mulberry-tree. 

1 1 m-must apologise for intruding upon you, Miss 
Crookenden/ he said, 1 b-but I have some p-property of 
yours to restore to you.’ 

I Indeed !’ the young lady answered, icily. 

Colthurst had an excess of stammering. He had been 

thrown off his balance by the sight of Lancelot. That 
was wholly, disagreeably, unexpected. After the episode 
of the morning he had reckoned on finding the young lady 
in more amenable company. It was only by sheer force 
of will that he could master that wretched stutter suffi- 
ciently to go on speaking at all. He was at a horrible 
disadvantage. And these two charming young people, 
who had so lately been deeply concerned in the fate of 
a fly, did nothing to help him. They were merciless — from 
their own point of view were not only justified, but abso- 
lutely right in being merciless. The minor paradoxes life 
presents are really cruel. In face of them shall one laugh 
or cry? I don't know. Any how, Colthurst did go on 
speaking. 

I I found this when you left the exhibition, that night/ 
he said, drawing out the holland-covered sketch-book. 1 It 
must have fallen out of the p-pocket of your cloak. I did 
my b-best to return it to you before leaving London. I 
called at your house, but I was told you had gone 
abroad. I b-brought it with me, because I thought it just 
p-possible I might have an opportunity of giving it to 
you.' 

Mary was really pleased at the recovery of her sketch- 
book. Unconsciously she softened slightly. She rose, 
and extended her hand to take it. But Lancelot inter- 
im Z 


48 


The Wages of Sin. 


vened. He put her hand gently aside, and took the book 
from Colthurst himself. He tried honestly not to be un- 
necessarily disagreeable, but his manner was offensive 
from the very carefulness of its civility, as he said — ‘ I'm 
sure my cousin's extremely obliged to you. I'm sure we 
are very much indebted to you for giving yourself so much 
trouble. Thanks.’ 

A kind of spasm of rage passed across Colthurst’s face ; 
but he had come here for quite other purposes than 
making a scene with this thick-skulled, thick-witted, young 
barbarian. He had sufficient self-control not even to look 
at Lancelot. His only safety, under the circumstances, 
lay in ignoring him altogether. So he addressed himself 
to Miss Crookenden again, a strange touch of humility, of 
pleading, like that of some dumb creature asking sympathy 
and toleration, in his expression. 

1 1 was d-determined to give it back to you myself, 
because I wanted to speak to you about your drawings. 
You must allow me to tell you they are very able — remark- 
able even. I have a good deal of experience in this 
matter. I know what I am saying. I have a right to 
express an opinion.' 

Colthurst put two fingers inside his collar and wrenched 
it outward. 

1 1 am not indulging in any banal attempt at flattery,' 
he went on. * Art is altogether too serious to me for me 
to use it as an excuse for p-pretty speeches to you or 
any one else. I detest the whole race of dilettante ama- 
teurs who play with it, and try to make capital in society 
out of an imaginary taste for it. Most amateurs’ drawing 
and painting is a mere expression of personal vanity, a 
bid for applause from persons as ignorant and trivial- 
minded as themselves. They are an unmitigated nuisance. 
They, and their paltry caricatures of nature, bring art into 
contempt.’ — The words were beginning to come. Colt- 
hurst was warming to his work. He was beginning to 
make himself felt — to dominate the situation. Miss 
Crookenden was attentive. Her eyes were growing 
responsive, dilating, deepening in colour. — * But with you 
it is different. You have got the root of the matter in 
you. You have a true gift. You ought to study. If you 


St. Michel-les-Bains. 


149 


don't know this already, you ought to know it, and there- 
fore I have come here to tell it you. You must study. 
It will be culpable of you if you neglect to study, 
possessing, as you do, a distinct gift.' 

He spoke in a tone of authority. Miss Crookenden was 
not, as a rule, particularly amenable to authority, yet she 
listened. Lancelot listened also. He was profoundly 
annoyed. 

1 Upon my word, Mr. Colthurst/ he broke in, ‘you seem 
to me to be taking ’ 

But Mary stopped him, laying her hand for a moment 
on his arm. — ‘ Be quiet, dear old boy/ she said, gravely. 
‘ It is kind of Mr. Colthurst to tell me this. You don’t 
quite understand.’ 

‘ You are quite right ; I don’t/ he answered, turning 
half away. 

For once Lancelot ceased to be submissive to his cousin 
and his love. He was displeased. 

Colthurst watched her, meanwhile, in his quick, restless, 
oddly violent way. 

‘ D-don’t wrap your talent up in a napkin, Miss 
Crookenden/ he said, stammering again. ‘ It is horribly 
d-dangerous to do that. The talents we have and refuse 
to use, mortify, putrefy, taint all our lives with a hateful 
death-scent of failure and regret.’ 

Mary Crookenden was very beautiful just then. Her 
lips smiled, her eyes positively blazed. But her beauty 
was a trifle hard, perhaps. The strength of the woman’s 
nature, not its sweetness, was evident. 

‘You believe I might really do something worth doing 
— that I might make a mark, in fact/ she said. 

She looked full at James Colthurst, and he looked back 
steadily, daringly, intently, for a perceptible space of time. 
The girl’s face kept its pure waxen whiteness. It was the 
man who flushed. 

‘ Yes/’ he said, ‘ I believe you may make a mark. I am 
almost prepared to say you may be famous — if you like.’ 

Then he bowed to her, still ignoring Lancelot, and 
passed from the shade of the spreading mulberry-tree, 
away across the sun-scorched grass again. 

‘ Et voila Satan , qui sen va /’ murmured the French- 


ISO 


The Wages of Sin. 


woman. * Chut / Scipio, chut T — this to the poodle, who 
curled up his lips and showed his teeth. — 1 Je me demande 
si la belle Anglaise vient de mordre dans le fruit defendu } ei 
si elle en donnera a son amour de gladiateur ? Mon Dieu } 
dest amusant, comme le diable se mele de tout / ’ 

‘ Fifteen, love — game ! ' cried the girls from the tennis- 
ground." One of those who had lost threw down her 
racquet petulantly . — ‘ It’s no use playing when she’s out 
here/ she said. 1 She is so very smart and superior. She 
always makes me lose. I wonder who that new man is 
who’s been talking to her ! He’s the third to-day.’ 

Between the cousins there was a long silence. Mary 
sat down again. She was very quiet, looking up ab- 
sently at the branches and glossy leaves overhead, still 
smiling a little, still with a great light in her eyes. All 
the latent ambition had been stirred into activity within 
her. The possibilities of life had grown august, imposing. 
She had always been impatient of restrictions, of medio- 
crity. She had always wished, and tried, too, in a hundred 
little ways, to differentiate herself from the ordinary run of 
social young womanhood. She had struggled to rise from 
the ranks. And now, so it seemed to her, she had been 
presented not only with a commission, but with a field- 
marshal’s baton. The assurance that she had the capacity 
of emerging, that she ‘ could an’ if she would,’ was superb 
to Mary Crookenden. It filled her heart to overflowing 
with proud gladness. 1 1 am almost prepared to say you 
may be famous — if you like ’ — the words rang through her 
like a trumpet-call. They dazzled her imagination, 
dazzled, too, her self-love. To her they were fraught 
with tremendous issues. Are such magnificent hopes and 
sensations, indeed, among the results of tasting the for- 
bidden fruit ? 

' Where did you say Aldham had put up ? ’ Lancelot 
inquired, abruptly. 

The question, and the tone in which the young man 
asked it, jarred upon Miss Crookenden. 

1 1 am not aware that I made any statement as to Mr. 
Aldham’s place of lt putting up,” ’ she replied. * I believe 
he has got rooms at the Hotel des Comtes de Savoie. It 
is in the market-place. Are you going to see him ? 9 


St Michel-les-Bains. 


I5i 

'Yes ; if you don’t want me for anything, I think I shall 
go and see him.’ 

Lancelot spoke in a curiously quiet, dogged manner. 

' Shall you dine with him ? ’ 

'Yes; if you don’t want me for anything, I shall stay 
and dine with him.’ 

'Oh, very well,’ said Miss Crookenden. 'I ‘dare say 
that will be the best arrangement. I shall be free to 
spend the evening with Sara Jacobini, then. We may as 
well go. Please give me my sketch-book.’ 

But Lancelot did not immediately accede to her request. 
He stood fidgeting with the tea-things in a way which 
Miss Crookenden found remarkably purposeless and pro- 
voking — pushing his cup and saucer back from the edge 
of the table till they ran into and nearly overset the honey- 
pot, which in its turn bore down upon the unhappy fly, just 
nicely recovered from his semi-drowning, and able to apply 
his mind to the interests of fly-life in a comfortable spirit 
again, and caught him by three legs under the bottom rim 
of it. The fly showed fight, kicking out his remaining 
legs, beating the air with ineffectual wings. But Fate, in 
the shape of the glass honey-pot, was heavy-handed. She 
held him fast. 

'Upon my word, Polly/ Lancelot said, slowly, un- 
conscious of the struggling fly, though gazing at the 
honey-pot, 'I don’t at all fancy your having back this 
book.’ 

' Why not ? ’ demanded Miss Crookenden. 

' Well, it’s been in that fellow’s pocket or portmanteau 
for the best part of a month. And— well— I’d rather you 
had nothing more to do with it.’ 

'Lancelot!’ she cried. And for once, whether from 
anger or from some more subtle feeling, Mary Crookenden 
blushed. 

The young man pushed the cup and saucer and honey- 
pot a little farther. The fly reeled off with a frantic buzz, 
minus a couple of legs.—' You told me not to interfere. 
I promised I wouldn’t. But it’s no good. I don’t like 
your getting mixed up with that man and people of his 
sort. I know I can’t prevent your knowing whom you 
choose- ' 


152 


The Wages of Sin. 


'No, you can’t. I am glad you recognise that fact,’ 
Miss Crookenden said. 

Lancelot continued looking helplessly into the honey- 
pot. He preferred his long-ago boyish complaint against 
his cousin. 

' You see you really are awfully changeable. One 
never knows where to have you. You said yourself that 
fellow Colthurst was insufferable when we saw him that 
night with Carr — you remember. He seemed to me just 
as insufferable just now, rather more so, in fact. But you 
let him spout away as much as he pleased. I can’t make 
it all out. I’d do anything in the world to please you, 
Polly — you know that — but I can’t pretend to like, to 
approve — don’t you know — when I don’t.’ 

' Have we arrived at the end of the recitals of my 
misdeeds ? ’ Mary asked, loftily. ' I hope so. Pray let 
us end this perfectly useless discussion. Go and dine 
with Mr. Aldham. I trust his conversation may have a 
soothing effect upon you, and that you may be little less 
aware of my errors and a little less didactic when we meet 
to-morrow. Good-bye, Lancelot.’ 

As she finished speaking, Mary stooped down to pick 
up her parasol, which lay at the foot of the mulberry-tree. 
She was very much ruffled, and consequently, I suppose, 
did not pay much heed to her movements. For in stoop- 
ing she struck her forehead sharply against the projecting 
stump of a sawn-off branch. Such absurd, childish little 
accidents are fatal to airs and graces, to superiority and 
grandeur. The blow made her cry out involuntarily and 
brought tears into her eyes. 

At the sound of that cry Lancelot’s heart melted within 
him. — ' Polly, Polly,’ he said, ' oh ! you’re not hurt ? ’ 

He made her sit down again, picked up her parasol — 
muttering something about that 4 blasted stump ’ — stood 
over her altogether gentle, solicitous, distressed. 

4 Dear Lance, why will you be odious and quarrel with 
me ? ’ Mary asked, turning the tables upon the unlucky 
youth with truly feminine unscrupulousness and despatch. 

' I don’t want to quarrel with you, if you’re not hurt,’ 
he answered, inconsequently. 'Tell me, Polly, are you 
sure you’re not hurt ? ’ 


St. Michel-les-Bains. 


153 


* Oh, no, not at all — not much ; at least, it was only a 
knock/- — Miss Crookenden rubbed her eyes. She knew 
that was undignified. But she was sitting upon her 
pocket, the small square of embroidered cambric was inac- 
cessible, and the tears did tickle so ! — 1 It will be all right 
directly,’ she went on. 1 I’ll get Chloe to put some eau- 
de-Cologne on it. Lance, are you all nice and good again ? 
You’re not cross? We were having such a dear little 
time/ 

‘ I know that/ said poor Lancelot. — He drew himself 
up, opening his fine chest, taking a deep breath. He 
wondered, in passing, if the girl the least measured what 
she caused him to endure when she made tender, intimate 
little speeches like that ? Of course she didn’t. — ' Here, 
give me your rattle-traps,’ he said, 'and let’s go after 
Chloe and the eau-de-Cologne. You mustn’t wait, or the 
bruise may come out.' 

Lancelot carried his cousin’s parasol and hat and gloves 
in-doors, and delivered them over to the old coloured 
woman in the wide corridor up-stairs. He lingered^ just 
a minute, before betaking himself to number twenty-two, 
to put on more civilized garments. Perhaps Mary might 
suggest some modification of plan for the evening. But 
she neither suggested fresh plans nor did she ask again 
for her sketch-book. As Lancelot washed and brushed 
and smartened himself up, he tried to derive satisfaction 
from the latter fact. This is a world, he reflected, in 
which you must learn to set one thing against another. 

As to the tiny plant of soldanella alpina and its fringed 
fairy bells, the waiter swept it into the slop-basin, along 
with the maimed fly, and the crumbs, and the cup-rinsings, 
when he came to clear away the tea-things. Beauty, too 
often, wanders into very queer company when once it 
begins to wander from home. 

Chapter IV. 

Madame Jacobini was restless. Do what she would, she 
could not settle off to sleep. Miss Crookenden had bidden 
her good-night. Mrs. Chloe had taken leave of her also, 
after providing her with a night-light set in a washing- 


154 


The Usages of Sin . 


basin. Madame Jacobini was funnily old-fashioned in 
many of her habits, and derived a peculiar sense of 
security from this, to most persons, very lugubrious form 
of nocturnal illumination. The voices and footsteps had 
grown silent in the garden. The electric bells had ceased 
to issue their urgent, irritable summons. The Hotel et 
Pension Chabaud was sinking into slumber. Even Madame 
Chabaud herself, laying aside her vigilance with her high- 
bosomed stays, hung in dishabille and in weak maternal 
adoration over the crib wherein reposed the hope of the 
house — fat, rosy, warm, dimpled, his brown head shaved 
nearly as smooth as a billiard-ball, and his thumb stuck in 
between his pouting lips. The seventy odd pensionnaires 
were, presumably, reposing, like the youthful Chabaud, 
horizontal in their respective beds. 1 Sleep and oblivion/ 
apparently, * reigned over all.’ 

But they did not reign over Madame Jacobini. Though 
horizontal in body, she was vexatiously upright, active, 
discursive in mind. She was nervous and feverish. She 
was possessed by the idea, vague yet persistent, that 
* something was wrong.’ Mary had been silent and dis- 
trait during the short time she passed with her that evening 
— had insisted on reading aloud scraps from a four days’ 
old ‘ Morning Post/ on the plea that this species of enter- 
tainment would be less fatiguing to the invalid than talk- 
ing. Madame Jacobini was a great talker, and, like most 
great talkers, detested being read to — specially when the 
reading in question took the form of snippets of stale 
news. 

Her bed seemed as hot as St. Lawrence's gridiron. She 
turned first on one side, and then on the other ; arranged 
and rearranged her shawls; counted imaginary sheep 
getting through an imaginary gap in a non-existent hedge, 
and indulged in other desolating mental narcotics of a like 
nature ; yawned ; wondered if anything really was wrong ; 
wondered why Lancelot had gone off to dinner with 
Cyprian Aldham — (Was that the result of a sudden fit of 
discretion on his part or on Mary’s ? Of course, it was 
just as well such a striking pair as the two cousins should 
not appear alone at table d'hote , the seventy odd pension- 
naires all eyes, and ears, and comments, and surmises, 


St. Michel-les-Bains . 


155 


looking on) — yawned again ; wondered whether she should 
have fortitude enough to drag herself out of bed to- 
morrow, and mount guard over that tiresomely striking- 
looking pair ; dozed a little at last, only to start into more 
vivid wakefulness than ever at a rustling against the door. 

* Who’s there ? ’ she cried. 

If burglars were roaming about the Hotel Chabaud, they 
might as well know she was awake, any how. 

‘ Sara,’ Miss Crookenden’s grave voice answered, softly, 
‘ may I come in ? ’ 

‘ Something is wrong,’ Madame Jacobini remarked, 
with conviction. 1 Yes, by all means come in.’ 

Mary was wearing a soft, white, Indian silk dressing- 
gown, plentifully trimmed with Valenciennes lace. It had 
flowing sleeves to it, that nearly touched the ground on 
either side. Thus arrayed, the girl looked singularly tall, 
slight, transparent even, in the vague light of the night- 
light, as she came forward across the bare parquet floor. 

1 It is too idiotic,’ she said, 1 but I have got the fidgets. 
I don’t feel as though I could stay in my room alone. One 
of those German-Swiss women is snoring in the most 
appalling way next door. She would waken the dead.’ — 
Mary moved across, put aside the muslin curtain, and 
looked out of the half-open window into the still summer 
night. Away across the garden she saw one dot of 
crimson light ; it moved, now and again, up and down. 
It must be just under the mulberry-tree. She had a 
sudden conviction Lancelot was sitting there, smoking a 
midnight cigar. — ‘And I am not dead,’ she went on, 
almost impatiently. ‘ I am quite execrably alive to-night.’ 

f So am I,’ replied Madame Jacobini, from her hot bed. 
1 There must be something in the air which causes insom- 
nia. You were quite right to come ; we’ll work off the 
fidgets together.’ 

1 Sara,’ Miss Crookenden said presently, * do you mind 
my telling about something very provoking that has 
happened ? ’ 

< No, my dear, not the least. I am so uncomfortable in 
any case that a little more or less will make no difference. 
I am exactly in the humour to hear what is provoking.— 
I knew it l ’ she added to herself*. 


The Wages of Sin. 


i 5 6 


• This morning, when I was out walking, I met Cyprian 
Aldham. He asked me to marry him.’ 

Madame Jacobini opened her mouth wide, and brought 
her teeth together with a snap. The room was so far dark 
that she could afford to give this highly inelegant vent to 
her feelings. 

4 And you refused him 1 ’ she said. 

4 No, I didn’t.’ 

4 Good heavens 1’ cried Madame Jacobini. 

She sat bolt upright in bed, while her shadow in profile 
— a little head and enormous, formless body, outstretched 
hands, and crooked, snake fingers — leapt up the wall 
beside her to the cornice. 

4 You accepted him, Mary ? ’ 

4 No, I did not do that either. I temporized. I con- 
sidered dear Miss Aldham — I know how §he wishes it. 

I considered a number of things. And then it is so 
difficult to say no, point-blank, unless you dislike a person 
very much. And I don’t dislike Mr. Aldham. In some 
ways I like him really very well.’ 

4 Ardent !' ejaculated Madame Jacobini. 

4 1 asked him to wait until next April. We always go 
to Brattleworthy in April. I told him I would give him a 
final answer then.’ 

4 Dear me 1’ said the elder woman. She meditated in 
silence for a few minutes. 4 And have you any idea what 
your final answer will be, may I ask ? It is a little hard, 
perhaps, to keep a man on tenterhooks for seven months, 
and give him an unfavourable answer at last.’ 

4 Oh, seven months is a long while, and I may never 
have to answer at all ! A thousand things may happen 
in seven months. The Last Day, which poor, dear Auntie 
Chloe is always on the watch for, may have come first.’ 

4 Don’t be profane,’ said Madame Jacobini. 

Mary leaned her fair head against the window-frame, 
and looked out at the dot of crimson light away in the 
darkness of the garden. 

4 1 suppose in the end I shall marry him. I suppose 
eventually I must marry. And he will do as well as any 
one else — better in some respects. I know his people, 
and like them, and they like me. He is a gentleman ; he 


St Michel-les-Bains . 


*57 


is by no means stupid, and he is very good-looking in a 
certain style/ 

* White-ivory-paper-knife style/ murmured Madame 
Jacobini. 

4 And he is a good man/ Miss Crookenden went on. 4 1 
don’t agree with you, Sara, about the relative degrees of 
virtue in men and women. I should prefer marrying a 
man I could look up to. I don’t want to lead; I would 
rather be led.’ 

4 Eh, eh ! ’ said Madame Jacobini, her eyebrows going 
well up into her hair. 

4 And he intimated to me that he had — could have, any- 
how, very shortly — plenty of money. He evidently wished 
me to understand, further, that there was no doubt that 
eventually Aldham Revel would belong to him. It is a 
lovely place. He let me know all this very nicely/ she 
added, as though wishing to be perfectly just in her state- 
ment, 4 really very nicely indeed. But he did seem to think 
these rather important items. I wonder if he thought they 
would influence my decision ! ’ — She paused. — 4 Perhaps 
he was wise/ she said, quietly, dispassionately. 4 Perhaps 
they will.’ 

Madame Jacobini gave no verbal expression to her feel- 
ings. But she was distressed all the same. 

The crimson dot was no longer visible. Lancelot — 
there was no mistaking his height, and bulk, and lazy 
swinging walk, even in the present almost-dark out-of- 
doors — came across the garden, humming softly, under his* 
breath, the air of a certain popular setting of Burns's 
4 Mary Morison.’ He dawdled slowly across the gravel in 
front of the hotel, his hands thrust well down in his 
pockets. 

‘ Oh, Mary, canst thou wreck his peace 
Wha for thy sake wad gladly dee ? ’ 

These words of the last verse of the song were just 
audible. The young lady standing at the open window 
on the first floor drew back. One of her flowing lace 
sleeves caught in the handle of the casement, causing it 
to swing against the wall with a rattle. Lancelot stopped 
humming his love-song, and glanced up. The light of 


158 


The Wages of Sin, 


the gas lamps on either side of the hotel door fell on his 
smooth, sunburnt, upturned face. 1 am not prepared to 
say that Lancelot's countenance lent itself to any remark- 
able range of expression. Its habitual expression was 
undoubtedly one of placid, sweet-tempered, rather sober 
well-being, the natural outcome of his simple, harmonious, 
unexacting disposition. To-night — or perhaps his cousin 
only fancied so, being a little perturbed in spirit herself — 
his expression was wistful, even sad. Disentangling her 
lace sleeve, Mary moved farther from the window, sat 
down by the round table in the centre of the room, and 
rested her head on both hands. The place where she had 
struck her forehead against the branch of the mulberry- 
tree throbbed and ached. 

‘ Yes, Sara/ she said, 1 Mr. Aldham gave me definitely 
to understand that he “had two coats and everything 
handsome about him.” So, if marry I must, I had really 
better marry him ; don't you think so ? * 

But in truth, Madame Jacobini was at a loss what to 
think just then. She was still distressed. She was also 
perplexed. She reflected, as she had often reflected before, 
that the members of the rising generation are rather 
incomprehensible. They are too wise, too acute, far too 
reasonable. They look at life, its offers and its limitations 
of happiness, in such a strangely judicial fashion. Miss 
Crookenden’s calm appraising of the man she professed 
herself more than half prepared to marry, struck the elder 
woman as painfully sensible, cold-blooded, dreary. Had 
the girl got no heart ? Or was her heart unawakened as 
yet ? Or was she doing violence to her heart out of some 
fantastic, mistaken sense of obligation ? Madame Jacobini 
was filled with vague alarms about her, vague impulsive 
longings to warm her into more generous, joyous existence. 

1 Come here, Mary,’ she cried, holding out her arms, 
while the shadow took another leap up to the cornice. 
‘You look like some ghostly moonbeam in that white 
dressing-gown, a moonbeam that has gone astray and 
turned itself into a woman ; and I have never liked the 
moon or anything to do with it since a friend of poor 
dear Jacobini’s — he was a musician too, had a maggot in 
his brain, of course, like all the rest of them — imagined, 


St. Michel-les-Bains. 


159 


I remember, he had discovered some extraordinary secret 
in acoustics, and was always writing to the Home Secre- 
tary, and President of the Board of Works, and a lot of 
other big-wigs, demanding they should empower him to 
reconstruct all the theatres and concert-halls in London 
on his infallible new system. — Well, he showed me the 
moon through a telescope. And it was horrible, utterly 
horrible ! I could not forget it. It gave me nightmare for 
a week afterwards. Come over here, Mary, and let me 
take hold of you, and assure myself you are good whole- 
some flesh and blood, not a stray beam of light reflected 
off the bosom of a planet, covered with hideous dead and 
dying volcanoes.' 

Miss Crookenden came to the side of the bed and took 
her friend's outstretched hands . — * You are very poetical 
to-night, Sara,’ she said. 

* That is more than can be said of you, my dear. You 
are alarmingly matter of fact,’ the elder woman answered, 
with one of her wide, genial smiles. 

* Oh, I can be poetical too, if I try ! — “ I am a butterfly, 
born in a bower, christened in a teapot, died in half an 
hour” — that is to say, most probably married at the end 
of seven months, which comes to much the same thing, 
rightly understood. Marriage is a sort of grave, Sara, in 
which, it seems to me, women are called upon to bury a 
whole lot of precious and delightful possibilities.’ 

*Ah, my dear !’ cried Madame Jacobini. She thought 
of her drive through the streaming streets of Bristol, in 
a hack cab, with the impecunious, irascible Jacobini beside 
her, upon her wedding-day. Had marriage then seemed 
as a grave to her, and not rather as an opening of doors 
into regions altogether lovely, romantic, supernal ? Again 
she rebelled against the joyless attitude of mind of the 
rising generation. 

1 Yes, but it is,’ persisted Mary. 1 To begin with, marry- 
ing one man is equivalent to refusing all other men. And 
that in itself is an agitating consideration, for many men 
have merits.’ 

At the far end of the passage footsteps passed over the 
boarded floor, and the door of number twenty-two creaked 
a little as Lancelot Crookenden dosed it behind him. 


i6o 


The Wages of Sitt, 


' What was that ? * 

' One of the servants going to bed, probably. — Miss 
Crookenden knelt down and kissed her friend. — 'Sara/ 
she said, ' should you very much mind giving up the Lakes 
and Venice ? I should be so glad to go home. I don t 
feel as if I dare dawdle about with nothing to do but 
ask myself will you, won’t you, will you, won’t you marry 
Mr. Aldham next spring ? Lancelot accused me of being 
changeable to-day. Perhaps I am changeable. And I’m 
afraid I shall make up my mind fifty thousand times and 
alter it again before April if I haven’t something definite 
to do. I want to go home and work.' 

' Work ? ’ Madame Jacobini inquired, a hint of irony in 
her tone. 

'Yes — don’t laugh at me. I mean to enter myself as a 
student at the Connop Trust School — you know, the De 
Tessier girls used to draw there — go there every day, give 
up society and smart frocks, and grind.’ 

' Dear me, this is quite a new idea ! ’ 

' No, it isn’t,’ the young lady asserted, eagerly. ' To-day 
has brought it all to a crisis — to-day has been a hundred 
years long. It has changed the face of nature. But the 
idea has been somewhere in the background of my mind 
for ever so long.’ 

Miss Crookenden’s reply was slightly disingenuous. 
But she could not quite summon up courage to mention 
her interview with Colthurst, and listen to the sarcasms 
which she foresaw would be levelled against the oblique- 
eyed Tartar in his new and prophetic capacity. Colthurst’s 
advice, warning, foretellings were a matter she purposed 
keeping to herself. Lancelot was not likely to speak of 
them. He had a great power of silence, specially regard- 
ing what appeared to him as disagreeable subjects. 

' Promise you won’t interfere ; promise you won’t object, 
and lodge a protest with Uncle Kent, and stir up the 
family to intervene and prevent me,’ she went on, quite 
excitedly. 

' I can promise nothing to-night. You have taken me 
by surprise — sprung a series of mines on me. I must 
think it over. And meanwhile, my dear, you really must 
go to bed.' 


St. Michel-les-Bains. 


161 


Mary clasped her hands with sudden violence. 'Oh, 
don’t send me away, Sara ! ' she implored. ' Let me stay 
with you. I don’t want to be alone. I’m frightened.’ 

Madame Jacobini put her arms round the girl, and drew 
the fair head on the down pillow beside her. It was not 
at all Miss Crookenden’s habit to give way to nervous 
agitations of this description. Madame Jacobini silently 
coaxed and soothed her. She felt sure there was some- 
thing behind — that she had by no means arrived at the 
bottom of the whole matter yet. ' Look here, dear child,’ 
she said presently : ' if you feel you have compromised 
yourself and regret it, be brave, and break with Mr. Aldham 
at once. If you have the slightest fear that you care — 
well, if you care for some one else more than you do for 
him, be honest, and tell him so to-morrow.’ 

'No, no,’ she answered, wearily, 'it isn’t that. Who is 
there to like better ? Not poor Mr. Carr, who is old 
enough to be my grandfather.' 

'That is hardly kind,' put in Madame Jacobini. 

'Nor that idiotic Sir Theophilus O’Grady. Nor Ludovic 
Quayle. I like him ; he entertains me. But he doesn’t 
really care two straws about me. I happened to be watch- 
ing him once when Lady Calmady — you remember she 
married that extraordinary man down in Hampshire whom 
Lancelot’s so devoted to, and who keeps race-horses — I 
watched him once at Mr. Carr’s when she came in 
unexpectedly. I don’t mean any harm. It was rather 
beautiful, in a way, you know. He must have cared for 
her very much once upon a time, and — well, that seemed 
to settle the question.’ 

'And how about Lancelot himself ? ’ Madame Jacobini 
asked cautiously. 

Miss Crookenden rose from her knees. — 'Lance is a 
darling ! ’ she said. 

' Ah ! ’ murmured the elder woman. 

' But I have no mcfre intention of marrying him — if I 
am to speak plainly — than I have of marrying the man in 
your enemy the moon, Sara. Aunt Caroline would fight 
to the last drop of her blood to prevent it. She is furious 
at his having come to see us now. She looks to Lancelot 
to float the name of Crookenden into the aristocratic haven 

M 


The Wages of Sin . 


162 

where she would have it to be. Oh, and then it would 
not do in lots of ways ! Lance would not give me room 
enough. He would cramp me. It is even conceivable I 
might get a little tired of him. He is a darling/ she 
repeated with conviction, 1 but he is also a wee bit of a 
bore. He has no imagination. He is quite too solid/ 
She kissed Madame Jacobini lightly once more. 

* I have been dreadfully selfish, staying talking so long. 
Now 1 will go to bed. Oh, yes, I am quite sensible again 
— afraid of nothing. I only hope to goodness that Swiss 
woman has done snoring/ 


The Drag on the Wheel . 


163 


BOOK IV.— THE DRAG ON THE WHEEL. 

* Some rise by sin, and some by virtue fall.* — Measure for Measure* 

Chapter I. 

Perhaps the saddest poverty of all is the poverty which 
maintains an air of superficial smartness. The poverty 
which, while gradually but surely sinking downwards, 
makes, as it sinks, convulsive and fruitless struggles 
against its fate. The poverty which has not lost desire 
in despair, but still clutches at cheap alleviations, fly-blown 
pleasures, hollow yet showy joys. The poverty which 
makes furtive attempts at elegance, and still has energy 
enough left to spread its poor draggled tail in the infre- 
quent sunshine with a foolish hope of impressing the 
passer-by. 

To study this description of poverty it is not necessary 
to go on pilgrimage to the East-end of London town, or 
even to cross the river — that sullen, dark-robed priest, 
who receives so many last confessions, and closes the 
eyes of so many sinners, broken in heart and fortune, 
with his cold wet fingers. 

Close against the streets and squares which, judging 
by their aspect in the early summer months, go so far 
towards proving the truth of the old saying that 1 London 
streets are paved with gold * — close against all this 
splendour, against these semi-celestial, flower-embosomed 
mansions, the poverty, of which I speak, flits, and flaunts, 
and hides, and peeps, and mimics, and hopes, and tarries, 
— on pavements just a little narrower, in houses just a 
storey or two lower — though still porticoed and stuccoed — 
in clothes only just a trifle less fashionable, but with a 
dimness and clinging odour about them indicative, in 
proportion to its intensity, of longer or shorter periods of 
incarceration in the back premises of the second-hand 
wardrobe-dealer. 


m 2 


The Wages of Sm. 


164 

This description of poverty is addicted to moving. It 
frequently changes its address. It lies abed late of a 
morning, and only regains a sense of security and freedom 
after dark. It is almost invariably in debt and in a per- 
sistent state of anxiety as to ways and means. It seldom 
enters a place of worship, though it contrives to show a 
gay face and smart garment in the music-hall or gallery 
of the theatre. It is generally vulgar, mean, tawdry, 
sensual, improvident, disreputable, incorrigible ; often 
clever, witty, kindly, unselfish, as well. And it is always 
pathetic — pathetic with the desolating pathos of things 
mistaken and gone astray ; of things by nature glad and 
pleasant, but through accident or wilful mis-use grown 
soiled and dirty ; of things born with a curse of inade- 
quacy and futility upon them — dancing, as vessels dance, 
all the more merrily over the waves for lack of the ballast, 
that, while it would make their course a slower and more 
laborious one, would save them from foundering at last. 

And it exists in plenty, this poverty. In its earlier 
stages both the charitable societies and the elaborate 
parochial machinery of the day, which in many directions 
effect such excellent work, fail, broadly speaking, ever to 
touch it. And so it goes its sad, laughing, weary, frivo- 
lous, profitless, way down, down, down — to the hospital 
ward, or the workhouse yard, or the fetid cellar; or, at 
best, gets back, in humbleness and, too often, in dishonour 
as well, to the quiet village on the seashore or among the 
green country lanes, whence in an evil hour, years ago, it 
journeyed up to town. There to wait, not without petu- 
lant outburst of anger, or fretful melancholy, or irremediable 
regret, till Death comes, in his mercy, to dry its silly tears, 
and soothe its worn nerves, and ease its long disappoint- 
ment, and lull it at length into a slumber which neither 
duns nor desire ever again shall break. 

It was to a region of South-West London, which for 
obvious reasons it would be invidious further to particu- 
larize, largely patronized by this particular form of poverty, 
that James Colthurst made his way about a fortnight after 
his return from the continent. He had a visit to pay, 
which from various causes promised to be a painful one. 
He had put it off as long as possible. If you are unhappy 


The Drag on the Wheel. 


165 


enough to have a skeleton-inmate of your private cup- 
board, it is but natural that you should avoid opening the 
cupboard door oftener than is absolutely necessary. The 
cupboard door being shut, you can manage not only to look 
the world boldly in the face, but even to forget the ugly, 
grinning thing standing there within for quite long spaces 
of time. When the cupboard door is on the jar, or, still 
worse, wide open, it is a different matter altogether. 

In respect of his profession Colthurst was, as we know, 
a genuine enthusiast. It should always be borne in mind 
that his father had been a celebrated divine. The saying, 
‘ Once a priest always a priest/ holds a deeper, more 
scientific truth, perhaps, than is generally recognised. No 
element in character is more persistent than the preaching 
element. It survives through generation after generation. 
The doctrine preached by the child may be surprisingly 
different to that preached by the father ; yet some doctrine 
the child assuredly will preach, — so let those that love 
not discourses stand from under ! In Colthurst's case 
the stream of didactic energy which in his father had 
issued in fiery religious zeal was diverted into quite another 
channel, viz., that of passionate belief in the function of 
art in the social and philosophic evolution of the imme- 
diate future. The sermons of an Evangelical popular 
preacher, and the pictures of an ardent admirer of work of 
Bastien-Lepage in painting and of Walt Whitman in 
literature, seem sufficiently far apart. Yet it is not too 
much = to assert that precisely the same force of inward 
conviction and the same vigorous individuality which had 
enabled old Dr. Colthurst to sway the emotions of a 
crowded congregation, now elevating them to heavenly 
places, now depressing them with salutary terrors of 
regions infernal, gave to his son's pictures their strange 
vitality, and to the man himself his fierce necessity for the 
promulgation of a new artistic propaganda. 

But to gain his end, to issue his propaganda with effect, 
Colthurst perceived clearly that the cupboard must be kept 
pretty tightly shut. There must be no unexpected incon- 
venient revelations of that fleshless countenance. And it 
was with the intention of taking one more look at the 
grisly inmate and then double locking the door, and keep- 


The Wages of Sin. 


1 66 

ing it locked — for exactly how long he did not carefully 
predetermine, luck might be on his side, unlooked-for 
events might come to his rescue — Colthurst was well just 
now, rested in mind and body, and disposed, consequently, 
to be hopeful — that he had started upon his unpleasing 
mission to the aforesaid region of South-West London. 

Holding a large bunch of chrysanthemums in one hand, 
walking more rapidly as he neared his destination — not 
from ardent desire to arrive but from very ardent desire 
to be free to depart again — Colthurst turned into a crescent 
of drab-coloured, two-storied houses, the lower windows 
of the majority of which exhibited cards announcing 
1 furnished apartments to let.’ The wind blew sharp and 
easterly, a first instalment of winter ; and all objects at 
more than a few yards distance had the flat, shadowless 
greyness upon them which is among the many results of 
wind from that most undelightful quarter. Looking along 
the crescent, the western sky was suffused by a dingy 
redness of sunset. A barrel-organ stood in the gutter, 
right against the kerb, about the centre of the curve of 
houses. While upon the dusty pavement, close by, a 
little girl was engaged in dancing a pas seul for the 
edification of a row of children seated, as in a stage-box, 
along the steps of one of the line of dreary porticoes. 

As Colthurst drew near the group he slackened his pace. 
For the scene, in its suggestion of the seamy side of 
civilisation, in its sordid details, in its unconscious irony, 
appealed strongly to his humour. The little girl postured, 
attitudinized, pirouetted with almost painfully faithful 
mimicry of some premiere danseuse of Opera Bouffe. 
Though small of stature, she displayed remarkable 
activity and self-possession. When the doorstep-audience 
applauded some specially startling feat of gymnastics, she 
swept them an elaborate curtsey in her dirty short-skirted 
cotton frock; or blew a coquettish kiss to the Italian 
organ-grinder, who, entering sympathetically, after the 
manner of his nation, into the artistic merit of the situation, 
could not restrain an occasional 1 Brava ! * Straws and 
litter, thanks to the sharp easterly draught, danced with 
the little girl. Colthurst noted them. He noted, too, the 
pinched chilly looks of the children — distressing, little 


The Drag on the Wheel ’ 


1 67 


mortals, whose laughter had a harshness in it, as of men 
and women grown cynical from long and intimate ex- 
perience of unlovelier aspects of life. One, a crippled 
boy, his head swathed in surgical bandages, leaned up 
against the pillar of the portico, clapping his red nerve- 
less hands with impish delight, as the performer sprang 
high into the air and came down on the flags again, — her 
pale red hair flying upward from under her hat, — upon 
the very tips of her indifferently shod toes. 

Colthurst was interested. Here was a telling subject, if 
faithfully rendered, for a picture of one side of London 
life. It is true that more than once already he had seen 
pictures of some such subject. But he preferred to wear 
his rue with a difference. Colthurst was no benevolent, 
middle-aged pater- familias f who regards childhood from 
the genial, sentimental, Christmas-party point of view. 
Not as a touching example of the pleasures of little inno- 
cents, happy in beautiful childlike fashion, 'showing with 
all the purity and sweetness of newly-opening flowers 
amid this barren wilderness of brick and mortar — not thus 
did he think of treating the subject. In sheltered homes, 
or safe down in the country, children of the flower-like 
order might exist still, perhaps. But on the London or 
Paris pavement, distinctly not. — These young people could 
not be accused of * trailing clouds of glory } after them, he 
felt very sure, as they had gathered on that doorstep. They 
were not moving in 1 worlds unrealized,’ but, to use the 
slang phrase of the hour, * knew their way about ' uncom- 
monly well. And it was as a satirist — though not so 
much of the children themselves, poor early-wise, early- 
sad little creatures, as of the social order he held mainly 
responsible for their deplorable precocity — that he thought 
of transferring their knowing antics and double-edged 
laughter to one of his canvases . — * Call it Theodora of the 
Pavement, or A coming daughter of Herodias,' he said to 
himself. 

He was about to cross the street so as not to interfere 
with the progress of the exhibition, when the little dancer, 
whose face, owing to the rapidity of her evolutions, he 
had as yet failed to see clearly, stood still for a moment, 
to take breath. — Colthurst paused, an exclamation on his 


1 68 


The Wages of Sin, 


lips. The child caught sight of him. She waved her 
hand to her audience with an inimitable air of patronage. 

4 You can go home, my dears/ she said. 4 The perfor- 
mance’s over for to-night.’ — Then she ran up to Colthurst, 
all honest childish eagerness, her small, wizened face 
beaming, her eyes dancing with delight. — ‘Why, Jim,' 
she cried, 4 we’d almost given up expecting you ! It’s 
ever so long since you’ve been to see us.’ 

Colthurst winced. He was acutely aware of the row of 
sharp eyes fixed on him from the door-step. Aware, too, 
of the insinuating bows and smiles of the organ-grinder, 
who, seeing the small dancer possessed such an aristo- 
cratic acquaintance, thought he might as well be paid for 
his services as orchestra. Colthurst flung him a sixpence, 
and, taking the child's outstretched hand, walked on 
quickly up the street. 

4 Who taught you to dance like that, Dot ? ’ he asked. 

4 Oh 1 nobody didn’t teach me. But Mrs. Prust — you 
remember, Mrs. Prust, Jim ? ’ 

4 Perfectly,’ Colthurst answered. 

4 Cap’n Prust’s got a new flag-staff in the back yard/ 
the little girl remarked, parenthetically. 

4 Has he ? Well, b-but about the dancing, D-dot ? ’ said 
Colthurst. 

4 Oh ! well, Mrs. Prust she took me to the theatre a 
little time back, because mother was mopy, and she said 
it was a sin for me to be moped too. And I saw the 
ladies dance. Oh ! it was lovely. Did you ever see ’em 
dance, Jim ? ’ 

4 Yes — no — sometimes.’ 

4 When I grow up I mean to be one of ’em. Do you 
think I ever could be one of ’em, Jim ? ’ 

4 All things are possible/ he said, rather bitterly. 

4 And when we come back/ continued Dot, 4 Cap’n Prust 
says let’s have a bit of something hot for supper, and tell 
him all we’d seen. And after supper I danced in the 
kitchen to show him how they did it, because he’d got his 
gout, you see, and couldn’t go. Mr. Snell was there — 
Mrs. Prust’s cousin as lives over to Shepherd’s Bush. He 
came and went along of us. He said he was blessed if 
I wasn’t as good as any of ’em. He said I danced prime.’ 


The Drag on the Wheel \ 


169 


' Did he ? ’ Colthurst remarked. 

The little girl had reeled off her share of the above 
conversation very glibly, in a clear voice of remarkably 
wide range of intonation. Her speech was strikingly 
mature, like her small person, her neat features, her tiny 
hands and feet. There was the same energy in it as in 
her movements — a singular finish, too, and alertness. And 
this notwithstanding the bloodless look of her wise little 
face, for her skin was dim and blanched as that of one 
who has been through a period of semi-starvation. 

' When you want to dance again, then, dance to Captain 
P-prust and Mr. Snell of Shepherd’s Bush, in the kitchen, 
p-please, Dot/ Colthurst said. ' D-don't dance out in the 
street. I don’t approve of it, do you hear ? Those 
children are not nice associates for you/ 

' 1 don’t ’sociate with those children/ she answered, 
promptly adopting the long word. ' I just let ’em look at 
me, Jim — that’s about all/ 

' And that is a great deal too much. Look here, Dot/ 
Colthurst went on, taking the silver paper off the bunch 
of chrysanthemums. 'You shall have these if you will 
promise me never to dance in the street again/ 

The little girl gave a long-drawn ' Oh ! ’ of admiration, 
looking at the flowers with hungry eyes. Colthurst had 
rung the door-bell of a house on the left hand of the 
crescent, and the two, the man and child, were standing 
together on the step. 

' Come, now, p-promise me/ he repeated. 

Dot stood on tip-toe, and buried her nose among the 
flowers, inhaling their pungent scent with a kind of rapture. 
Then she whirled herself round wildly. 

' It ain’t fair/ she said, ' because you can see I 
want ’em ever so badly. And if I promise I’m bound to 
keep. I say, Jim, why ever are you so particular? ’ 

Colthurst’s dark face flushed. — 'Will you have the 
flowers, Dot ? You can only have them on that condition/ 

The child hesitated, jumping up and down— her agita- 
tion of mind finding vent in this agitation of body. — 
' Oh ! dear, oh ! dear, I do so want ’em/ she cried. ' Cant’ 
I pay you for ’em any other way ? I like the dancing, 
too, and you see we’ve no music at home.' 


70 


The Wages of Sin . 


Colthurst shook his head. 

1 Then I’ll have 'em. I won’t dance in the street any 
more. I promise.’ — She seized the bouquet, and then 
held it daintily, as though ashamed of her passing violence 
towards the beautiful blossoms . — 1 I’ll promise,’ she re- 
peated. 1 But I think it’s rather a shame of you, Jim, to 
teaze and make nasty old conditions.’ 

As she finished speaking the house-door was opened 
from within, disclosing a solid female form arrayed in 
black — the black of economy rather than of bereavement, 
as might be surmised from the style of the wearer’s cap. 
This was black, also, but broke forth into nodding green 
and scarlet chenille blossoms, planted in a bed of lace, 
about the ears. A cap of an order, alas ! rapidly becoming 
extinct; which, thanks to a flat silk band, slightly dis- 
guised by figured net, passing tightly over the top of the 
head, and by the wealth of its aural decorations, imparted 
a fine effect of width to the lower portion of its owner’s 
face, making it, indeed, not unsuggestive of the human 
countenance reflected in the bowl of a tablespoon. 

1 What, Mr. Colthurst ! — Never,’ cried the owner of the 
cap. 

As he stepped into the narrow entry, redolent of a 
penetrating odour of gas and Irish stew mixed in about 
equal proportions, and confronted the speaker, Colthurst 
knew, metaphorically speaking, that the cupboard door 
was opening, opening too. It had been ajar ever since 
he had recognised his little friend Dot in the attitudinizing 
Theodora of the Pavement. Colthurst felt he must wait 
awhile and screw his courage up a peg or two higher 
before he came face to face with the dreadful thing that 
stood awaiting him, there, within. 

1 How d’ye do, Mrs. P-prust,’ he said, as lightly as he 
could. ' I’m sorry to hear from Dot that your husband 
has been seedy again.’ 

The countenance in the spoon was not an expressive 
one. It wore an habitual air of comfortable neutrality, as 
of a well-to-do cat blinking sleepily in the sun. But if 
nature had denied Mrs. Prust the grace of facial mobility, 
it had endowed her with strong feelings and considerable 
power of putting them into words. It so happened that 


The Drag on the Wheel. 


171 

James Colthurst was in the excellent woman's black books. 
A brief struggle took place within her, during which she 
debated whether she should testify to that fact by chilling 
brevity of reply, or whether — the temptation was a heavy 
one, for Mrs. Prust was conscious of matrimonial trials of 
extreme severity — she should enter fully into the existing 
physical condition of Captain Prust. Moral principle 
gave way before the craving for sympathy common to 
woman. Let those who have nursed a gouty ex-ship- 
master, blessed with an unlimited capacity for nautical 
anecdote, cast the first stone ! 

* Seedy ! ’ she exclaimed, scornfully. ' No, Mr. Colt- 
hurst, more than that, sir. Cap'n Prust has been bad. 
Very bad. Gout. And rising.' — Mrs. Prust laid her hand 
descriptively upon the middle of her own stout person, 
and an ominous emphasis upon the conjunction. — 'And 
rising,' she repeated solemnly. ' No more power in the 
legs than an infant. And the irritability. And, at times, 
the language. And yet continues to take in well, Mr. 
Colthurst. A little picking at breakfast some mornings ; 
but a full meal at dinner and supper much the same.' 

* That must be an encouragement to you, Mrs. Prust,' 
Colthurst remarked. ' A good appetite is a good sign.’ 

' Cap’n Prust'll last his time, sir, no doubt,’ she replied 
with dignity. ' It may be short or it may be long. — 
There, Dot, run along like a good little maid, and show 
her mammy the pretty flowers. — I could mention some,’ 
she continued, lowering her voice, blinking mysteriously 
at Colthurst, while she raised her fat hands in mingled 
protest and warning — ' I could mention some whose time 
may very well be shorter than Cap’n Prust, judging by 
what they take in. Lord love you, why a sparrow 'ud 
starve upon it ! And a kinder, more inoffensive creature, 
I will say, Mr. Colthurst, never came down over stairs. 
Keeps herself to herself. No throwing up about the past, 
whatever the past may be. No words. No complaints. 
But the tears, Mr. Colthurst, in secret. The tears and the 
pining. Poor young thing ! ' 

She blinked her kind, little, grey-green eyes as though 
the sun shone very full in them, and shook her head until 
the chenille blossoms vibrated wildly. 


172 


The Wages of Sin. 


' There is blame somewhere, Mr. Colthurst. I ask no 
questions. But the tears in secret, the tears and the 
pining. Oh ! it 'ud break a heart of stone. I'm truly 
glad you have come back, for it's time it was all looked 
into. If this was to be my last word on earth* — a 
contingency which appeared, it must be allowed, highly 
improbable, — ' I should say so, Mr. Colthurst. It's quite 
time it was all looked into, or there may be those who’ll 
have something on their minds that won’t lie there easy, 
or let them lie easy either.’ 

Mrs. Prust concluded with a strong note of indignation 
in her voice, — voice disclosing her West Country origin 
by its inclination to rise into a distinct shrillness at the 
end of a sentence. 

Colthurst, meanwhile, who found listening to the above 
conversation about as pleasant as rubbing salt on a sore, 
had kept his eyes fixed on the yellow and white diamonds 
of the oil-cloth of the entry floor, while he pushed his 
moustache restlessly up from his lip. Now he glanced at 
his companion — looking, so at least that lady informed 
her disabled mariner below stairs, some few minutes later, 
' more like a bilious fiend than anything human. Old 
Scratch himself 'ud have been pleasant company compared 
to him.' 

'You are a sensible woman at bottom, Mrs. P-prust,' 
he said, in his quick whispering way. 'You have a good 
lodger who gives you very little trouble and pays you 
regularly. Let me advise you not to make it impossible 
for her to remain with you.' 

And then poor James Colthurst — the lion of the year's 
season; the painter for possession of whose pictures 
dealers struggled; the man of undeniable genius, the 
preacher of newer and nobler ideas; the zealot filled 
with burning enthusiasm for truth, as he saw it, and that 
beauty, terrible perhaps, but illuminating, which all truth 
must needs bring along with it — walked on up the narrow 
entry, with its hideous oil-cloth, its shiny walls hung with 
paper representing impossible blocks of a happily unknown 
description of marble, its rancid smell of gas and stew, 
opened the door of the room on the right and stood face 
to face at last with that which he shrunk from, deplored, 


The Drag on the Wheel . 


173 


dreaded, that which, as he feared, rendered his life rotten 
at the core, and clipped the wings of his fairest hopes and 
aspirations, — the skeleton of a dead love and a living sin. 


Chapter II. 

A square room, with double doors at the back disclosing 
a vista of narrow and not over tidy bed-chamber. Horse- 
hair covered chairs, the seats of them black and shiny. A 
sofa to match, with a Joseph's coat of many colours in the 
form of a woollen antimacassar thrown over either end 
of it in the hope of disguising the unrestful solidity of its 
two sausage-like bolsters. A marble-topped cheffonier, 
the doors of it a little unsteady as to their hinges. On 
the wall above, a picture of a church made of dried sea- 
weed, glazed and set in a broad frame composed of small 
shells. On the mantel-piece a pair of green glass candle- 
sticks, with jingling drops to them ; and centrally, in the 
place of honour, the model of a vessel in a glass case, 
fondly supposed to be Captain Prust’s schooner, the Salome 
of Cardiff, as she appeared off the banks of Newfoundland 
after encountering what is technically known as ‘ a breeze/ 
— her masts, spars, and rigging thickly incrusted with ice, 
rendered in the model by a plentiful sprinkling of morsels 
of splintered glass. In one corner of the room a litter of 
portfolios and dirty canvasses piled on the top of a long, 
narrow, wooden sea-chest, in company with two or three 
dilapidated band-boxes. In the middle of the room a 
square table, covered by a black-and-green cloth ; a tray 
upon it and tea-things, remains of bread and butter, a pot 
of canned lobster, and a plate of flaccid water-cresses. — 
This was what Colthurst saw on entering the dining- 
room of Mr. Prust’s lodging-house. This, as setting to 
two very dissimilar figures — a tall, finely-made woman, 
still young, but worn, her beauty coarsened by hard living 
and sorrow, and a small, alert, changling-like child, whose 
hands were full of chrysanthemums, golden and russet 
and white. 

As he came in the woman rose from her place at the 


174 


The IVages of Sm. 


table and stood before the grate, her head and its unruly 
masses of dark hair thrown back. She looked silently 
full at him out of wide-open grey eyes that had a dry 
light in them. Over her dress she wore a claret-coloured 
ulster; stylish — the word must be allowed to pass, since 
it covers the fact — in cut, but stained, frayed about the 
cuffs and hem, and adorned by steel buttons as extensive 
in size as they were defective in number. A handsome 
woman, but with a dinginess upon her, only too much in 
harmony with the dingy room, the dingy street, visible 
through the window, curving away to that dingy glow of 
sunset behind the contorted chimney-cowls and slated 
house-roofs in the west. The child was dingy, too. Even 
the flowers, so it seemed to Colthurst, as he closed the 
door behind him and stood on the near side of the table, 
even the flowers had lost their freshness and lustre since 
they had passed into the hands of their present possessor. 
A blight was upon this place, and everything in and about 
it, which filled him with a loathing and unreasoning 
physical disgust. 

A merely conventional greeting either of words or of 
hand-shake was impossible between these two persons — 
an empty form for which neither had the heart ; and any 
tenderer description of greeting had unhappily gone out 
of fashion between them. So an awkward pause of silence 
ensued. Then the woman with a gracious movement of 
. courtesy spoke. 

4 You’ve made the poor little maid very happy over her 
flowers, Jim,’ she said, her expression melting into a 
sudden sweetness of appeal about the eyes and full-lipped 
mouth. 

Colthurst had been living in something of a fool’s para- 
dise, seeing visions, dreaming dreams ; cheating the actual 
by mental excursions into the just conceivably possible ; 
indulging that riotous imagination of his in the keen Swiss 
air and daring Italian sunshine, while he walked over 
mountain-passes, or through the deep cool streets and 
glaring piazzas of southern cities, his eyes greedy alike of 
their beauty and grandeur, their grotesque figures, their 
sinister historical suggestions. And through all the shift- 
ing sights, merry or sad, of his foreign holiday, through 


The Drag on the Wheel. 


175 


all the varying emotions, the vivid fleeting impressions, 
the hot race of thought and perception that had gone on 
within him, one impression, one vision, had been con- 
stantly recurrent. It had come upon him when he was 
a trifle tired and pensive, under vast silent mountain 
sunrise or sunset ; or during the droning, incense-stuffy 
service in some stately cathedral, where the air seemed 
thick with the mystery of the supernatural. It had come 
upon him equally when he was in full possession of him- 
self, mind and body; when he was vigorous, excited, 
moved by quick, wide-reaching apprehensions of things. — 
The vision of Mary Crookenden listening, responsive, 
drinking in his words ; awakening, so he flattered himself, 
to a fulness of life and intention wholly new to her, as she 
stood in the shadow of the mulberry-tree in that 
sun-scorched hotel garden at St. Michel-les-Bains. He 
had broken down the wall of prejudice which had divided 
her from him. He had made her recognise him. He 
had established a relation with her. All this had been a 
matter of ten minutes at the outside. He had not seen 
her again — had hardly wished to see her indeed. Yet he 
was satisfied, for the time being at all events. For some- 
thing intangible, yet actual, had, so he believed, passed 
between them, from him to her. That was all he wanted. 
He had paid off the old score, he had taken his revenge, 
taken it in a way at once occult and beneficent. 

All this will probably appear to the reasonable and 
right-minded very elaborate nonsense. To James Colt- 
hurst it was not nonsense at all. It was delicious, it was 
inspiring. He played with the thought of it continually. 
He went back to it again and again, taking strange 
fantastic delight in the proud maidenly purity, in the 
reserved, almost cold loveliness of the woman whom, 
after a pretty sharp struggle, he had, momentarily in any 
case, conquered. For though Colthurst's feeling in the 
matter was abnormal, morbid even, it was quite free, I 
think, from that which is sensual or base. He did not 
in the least mistake the nature of his relation to Miss 
Crookenden. He knew well enough it was of the intellect, 
not of the affections. He hardly regretted that— as yet. 

And now after all this enchanting careering around in 


1 76 


The Wages 0/ Sin. 


Fool’s Paradise, in regions mysterious and visionary; after 
th's innocent, even, in a sense, elevating debauch of fancy, 
was he brought up short against a blank wall of fact. 
Fact gave him a blow on the head as with a pole-axe, 
bidding him mind what had been, rather than what might 
be. He had known this visit would be a pretty severe 
trial ; but it proved worse, ten times worse than he 
expected. It was indescribably jarring to his imagination. 
This dingy, unlovely room, the tinned lobster and flaccid 
water-cresses, even the not ungracefully tendered thanks 
for his gift of flowers, sickened him. And it was only by 
a very strong effort of will that he controlled himself 
sufficiently to answer reasonably. 

I Dot got her nosegay at the price of a promise/ he 
said, stammering more than usual. 1 1 am sorry to say 
she was not keeping very creditable company when I met 
her just now. You ought to send her to school or keep 
her more indoors, Jenny. Dot is getting too old to run 
wild in the streets in that sort of way.’ 

{ Do you hear that, Dot ? ’ Jenny Parris asked, her face 
hardening again. 

I I hear/ the child answered, shaking herself impatiently. 
* We’ve been all through it once already.’ 

Jenny leant her shoulders back against the mantel- 
piece, pushed her hands down into the pockets of her 
claret-coloured ulster, and looked at Colthurst with a dry, 
half-contemptuous smile. 

* I’ve got a nice, dutiful little daughter, likely to be a 
comfort to me in my lonely old age, haven’t I, Jim ? ’ she 
said. 

At that moment, it must be conceded, Jenny Parris did 
not precisely embody Mrs. Prust’s description of her, as 
the kindest, least offensive creature that ever came down 
over stairs. Her bearing, and the tones of her voice, were 
by no means calculated to appease James Colthurst. If 
she had been gentle and winning with him — she could be 
so at times — he would have done his best to spare her, to 
shut the cupboard door — the old metaphor may serve once 
more — as softly as possible, and double-lock it without any 
unpleasant grating of the key. You see Colthurst was in 
the disagreeable position of seeing a noble life before him. 


The Drag on the Wheel. 


1 77 


to which all the higher instincts of his nature drew him 
with strong attraction, while a moral obligation to this 
woman held him back. Should he repudiate that obliga- 
tion once and for all ; and, looking to the greater right, 
which certain philosophers tell us justifies the lesser 
wrong, sacrifice the individual to the demands of his own 
self-development, which, in a sense, was sacrificing it to 
the good of the race ? To gain a great end, should he 
perpetrate a trifle of immediate cruelty ? 

With a sudden acuteness he perceived a way of escape. 
Jenny should decide his line of action by her own. If she 
was reasonable, he would be reasonable too, gentle and 
merciful even ; though it would, in his present frame of 
mind, cost him a good deal to be so. If she was un- 
manageable, well, then, her blood must be on her own 
head, she would have brought her condemnation upon 
herself, and his conscience would be free of offence. 

All this passed through his mind in the few seconds 
during which he stood opposite to her, at the near side of 
the table. Her defiant, taunting attitude calmed him, 
because it went to justify the line of conduct which he 
knew it would be easiest for him to pursue. So he made 
her no answer, but pulled out one of the shiny horse-hair 
chairs from its place against the wall, called Dot to him, 
sat down putting his arm round her, while he helped to 
rearrange her drooping chrysanthemums. 

Jenny watched him, watched his bent head, the quick 
deft movements of his hands, his glances and by-play with 
the little girl, rapid changes of expression crossing her 
mobile countenance. His indifference galled her shrewdly. 
At last she could endure it no longer. 

‘Jim/ she said, * can’t you spare a trifle of notice from 
the child for me ? It’s a long time since I’ve seen you. 
One might have thought you’d have a little something to 
ask or tell me.’ — Her speech was interrupted by a hard, 
dragging cough . — 1 Did you have a good time while you 
were away ? ’ she asked, when she recovered her breath 
again. 

1 A very good time,' he answered, concisely, without 
raising his eyes from Dot’s bouquet. 

4 Did you see anybody you knew ? 9 

N 


i 7 8 


The Wages of Sin. 


‘Yes/ 

‘Men or women ? ’ Jenny demanded. 

Colthurst looked at her, and not quite pleasantly. 
‘ B-both,’ he said. 

There was a silence of some minutes. Then she 
broke out impetuously : — ‘ Look here, ^Jim, it’s no use 
beating about the bush like this. I want to know what’s 
to happen to us all. That’s what you’ve come to tell, I 
suppose. Let the child go — run along down to Mrs. Prust 
for half-an-hour, Dot, there’s a good maid.’ 

She glanced at Colthurst significantly as she spoke, and 
nodded her head towards the door. But unfortunately 
Dot was a young lady whom it was not easy to dispose 
of in this unceremonious fashion. She wriggled herself 
up on to Colthurst’s knee, nestled her small person back 
against his broad chest, and from that coin of vantage 
stared at her mother in naughty, daring challenge. 

‘ I ain't a-going bothering downstairs to Mrs. Prust,' 
she said; ‘Jim’s very fond of me, ain’t you, Jim? Mr. 
Snell says gentlemen gives flowers to the ladies they 
thinks most of. Jim didn’t bring any flowers for you, he 
brought ’em for me. That shows he’d like to have me 
stay.' 

‘ For God’s sake don’t take the child’s part and set her 
up against me. She’s a wicked enough little thing as it 
is.’ — The woman spoke low and hurriedly. There was a 
ring of real misery in her voice. 

Colthurst was touched somehow in the midst of his 
bitterness and disgust. He put his hand under the little 
girl’s chin, turned her pale, wizened face towards him 
and kissed it; whereat she flung her arms about his 
neck and hugged him with extravagant manifestations of 
delight. Then he stood her down on the ground, though 
she struggled and protested, trying passionately to keep 
her place on his lap. 

‘ Go downstairs, Dot,’ he said, hoarsely. 

‘ Do you mean that ? ’ she asked. Colthurst bowed his 
head. 

For a few seconds she waited gazing at him ; the two 
strong wills, the man’s and the child’s, in opposition. 
Suddenly Dot turned, swept the flowers higgledy-piggledy 


The Drag on the Wheel. 


179 


into the lap of her soiled pinafore, gave her mother a 
vicious look in passing, and ran out of the room. 

Colthurst got up and shut the door after her, with a 
certain deliberation. Then he went over and stood in the 
window, keeping his back to the light. The child's pre- 
sence had acted as a restraint ; now that it was removed 
he knew the bad quarter of an hour had really come. 
Colthurst gathered himself together and waited. He 
wanted to avoid making the first move. 

Jenny leaned her elbow on the mantel-piece and buried 
the fingers of her left hand among the masses of her rough 
hair. The dull glow of the western sky lit up her hand- 
some worn face and her claret-coloured ulster. She 
hesitated a little; but she was too anxious for much 
diplomacy. She went straight to the heart of the 
matter. — ‘ When are you coming back here to live, Jim ? ’ 
she asked. 

The uncompromising directness of the question stag- 
gered Colthurst. He temporized. 

‘ 1 don’t know,’ he said. 1 1 have a quantity of work 
in view — some orders for portraits, thanks to Carr, besides 
two or three good subjects for pictures that I want to get 
into shape as soon as possible. I couldn’t work at them 
here. It’s impossible. The accommodation isn’t sufficient.’ 

‘You could take the drawing-room floor. It’s empty. 
And you’re a rich man, now ; you could afford it.’ — Again 
Jenny’s voice had a taunting ring in it. 

‘ Mrs. Prust’s drawing-room floor is a most desirable 
apartment, no doubt,’ Colthurst replied. ‘ But it is not 
precisely adapted for my purpose. I must have plenty of 
space.’ 

‘ I dare say Mrs. Prust ’ud let the bed be moved out 
of the back room,’ remarked Jenny Parris. 

The line running across Colthurst’s forehead grew 
deep. He was nearing the point of exasperation. Clearly 
it was impossible to argue the matter on these lines with- 
out losing his temper fatally. He intended if possible not 
to lose his temper. He was silent for a little. When he 
spoke again it was in a tone of statement rather than of 
argument; for he saw that he must definitely take the 
upper hand of poor inconvenient rebellious Jenny Parris 


i8o 


The Wages of Sin . 


* I have further plans/ he said. * I have a notion of 
founding a school and getting students to work under me, 
as they do in some of the French studios. What is the 
use of having ideas if you don’t share them, don’t impress 
them upon other minds ? That’s the horrible part of a 
great personal talent,’ he went on, softening, forgetting 
himself and the exigencies of the situation in the satisfac- 
tion of self-expression — f it dies with you. Unless you 
have made disciples in whom your spirit, your principles, 
your methods are incarnate, you leave only the corpse of 
your work behind you ; leave it for pedants to finger and 
fumble over and pull to pieces, to misconstrue as only 
your thorough-paced pedant, with his semi-paralytic, 
penny-farthing intelligence, can misconstrue and miscon- 
ceive the thing he gives half a lifetime to elucidate and 
illuminate. Do you suppose I can be content to flare 
away for ten years or so, as a kind of comet, with no 
recognized legitimate place in this cloudy, old, English 
artistic heaven; and then be consigned to the limbo of 
aesthetic experiments, aesthetic curiosities ? Good Lord, 
no. I want to leave the living soul, not the corpse of my 
work behind me; a soul that will grow and develop, and 
be every bit as alive a century hence in my followers as 
it is to-day in me. — There’s a grand opening for me, 
Jenny, if I am free to make use of it. I must go on with 
one picture after another till I get the public thoroughly 
accustomed to my style, my form of thought, my outlook 
on life. Yes, I mean to go the whole hog. I do propose 
to myself to effect nothing less than a revolution. And 
to do that, I must get hold of the younger men, make 
them believe in me, still more believe in that which I 
believe — stand by me, back me up, carry on my work. I 
will give them the ideas ; they, by developing those ideas, 
will give me a sort of immortality.’ 

And the woman listened. Did more, melted with sym- 
pathy and enthusiasm, though she did not understand a 
tithe of what he said. For she had loved him. Poor soul, 
did love him still. Loved the whole personality and 
individuality of him, even to his oddities and eccentricities, 
the less as well as the more admirable effects of him — 
loved his rapid stuttering speech, his quick restless 


The Drag on the Wheel, 


181 


movements, his vehemence, his violence and precipitation ; 
loved the restless action of his well-made hands ; loved 
even to see him, as excitement gained him, wrench at his 
shirt-collar or push his moustache up away from his lip. 

For affection such as Jenny’s has passed the limits of 
a refined and discriminating taste. It has little to do with 
the intellect, with appeals to the intelligence, or even to 
the sense of beauty. It lies away back in the essences 
and origins of things, deeper than our meagre forms of 
speech. It has, indeed, no need of words to express itself. 
Words are only baffling and impeding to it; for it is too 
profound, too intimate, too single and uncomplicated to be 
articulate. It has small brains, perhaps ; it certainly, on 
the other hand, has a large heart. It does not weigh, does 
not consider, does not think ; but feels only — spontaneous, 
uncompromising, immediate. It is among the most beautiful, 
the most unmanageable, the most dangerous things the 
world has to show. 

And so, erect, her eyes liquid, lustrous, all the dry light 
gone out of them, a glow on her worn face that had nothing 
to do with the dingy sunset without, but with a sunrise of 
returning admiration and assurance within, Jenny stood 
listening. For this woman was generous, quick to hope, 
to forget and forgive. And in her faulty, impulsive nature, 
there was, even yet, a great longing after things pure, 
lovely, and of good report. Now it seemed to her that 
Colthurst unfolded before her a magnificent, if somewhat 
cloudy conception. Her whole spirit rose in enthusiastic 
response to meet it, dimly comprehended though it was. 

‘Now is my chance/ Colthurst went on, in his hot 
urgent way. 1 And it is a glorious one, a wonderful, epoch- 
making one — if I am big enough to lay hold of it. The 
bulk of English art is like the valley of dry bones, dead, 
desiccated, profitless, useless — the refuse of what has been 
and is not ; no genius, no intention, no purpose, no warmth 
and moisture left in it. Well, I have got to make those 
dry bones live. To turn them from a miserable, imbecile 
mockery of past beauty and greatness into a living present 
beauty and greatness. I have got to breathe the breath 
of a great resurrection into them, to make those dry bones 
cometogether, to clothe them with flesh, to make them 


The Wages of Sin % 


182 

rise up and stand on their feet — a great aimy, strong 
with modern thought, with the modern gospel of science, 
of democracy, of sacred, uncompromising fact. I have got 
to put my fingers through all the aesthetic, artificial rot and 
rubbish of the day, and the effete, emasculated classicism 
alike. What do we want with reconstructions of the 
age of Zeus and Aphrodite ? Or of the age of Nero and 
Domitian ? Or of the age of Arthur and Charlemagne ? 
Or of the miserable, pedantic artificialities of the reign of 
Queen Anne ? They are all dead and gone, exploded, 
past, done with. We have moved on, thank heaven. 
Why call up their futile ghosts ? What we want is an 
art up to date — the drama of love and hate, joy and 
torment, degradation and splendour of the men and women 
of to-day. To show the poetry and romance and glamour 
of the mind, and heart, and push, and noise, and vigorous 
living of to-day; that’s what has got to be done. And, by 
God,’ cried Colthurst, passionately, 1 by God, I’ll do it.’ 

And Jenny Parris stood listening, her lips parted, 
drinking in his words ; drinking the intensity and daring 
of him as a thirsty land drinks in the beating autumn 
rain. She shook back her hair with a glad toss of her 
head, and answered him: — ‘And you will do it, Jim. 
You’re big enough, no fear. You're strong enough and 
clever enough. If you give your mind to it you’m bound 
to win. I’d like to see the man that would try to stop 
you. And, look here, Jim, how can I help ? ’ 

Colthurst had been very far from talking for effect 
Even in his most exaggerated moments, he was, I am 
happy to say, guiltless of that. The thoughts and phrases 
had welled up, when he was once started, with little 
enough direction or diplomacy on his part. Nevertheless, 
in speaking he had undoubtedly supposed that every 
sentence would have shown Jenny, more and more plainly, 
the distance that separated him from her, his future from 
hers. And so her question fell on him like a thunderbolt 
out of a clear sky. He was alarmed, terrified almost, at 
the unquenchable loyalty which made her thus claim her 
place again at his side. How could she help ? Only in 
one way ; and to point out that way was brutal in face of 
that same loyalty. Colthurst paused, amazed, in a sense 


The Drag on the Wheel. 


183 


confounded; filled with a sudden dreadful fear that he 
should find it impossible to shut the cupboard-door and 
hide the grinning skeleton after all. 

Jenny mistook the cause of his embarrassment. 

i Oh, I know/ she said, bridling in proud apology, ‘I’m not 
the woman I was. We've been through pretty rough times 
together, you see, Jim, and they’ve left a bit of a mark on 
me. I've lost flesh ever since I’ve had that plaguing old 
cough of nights. My arms are poor,' she added, stripping 
up the sleeve of her ulster and of the dress beneath it, and 
contemplating the arm — white and muscular, but as sadly 
angular at wrist and elbow — with a pathetically reproachful 
expression. 

Then she glanced at Colthurst, a fine candour, an 
absence of all bitterness in her face, as she continued : — 

1 But you know, Jim, I haven't been very happy lately. 
There’s been nobody to please and keep going for. Dot’s 
the most perverse little mortal that ever stepped this earth. 
She’s just delighted to plague me; and if I say a word 
she turns round as impudent as you like, and laughs. 
There’s no being upsides with her. And you seemed to 
have changed, Jim, and taken to fine folks and fine ways 
I knew nothing about. I'm afraid I’ve had nasty grudging 
thoughts about you — wished you’d never painted the 
44 Road to Ruin ” and the 44 Evening of Labour,” and made 
yourself a great man. I fancied I liked the old starvation 
wages best, but if I see you haven’t really changed, Jim/ 
she added very sweetly, in her incurable hopefulness — 
4 if we can have the dear old times back, and a little more 
comfort into the bargain, a little more to wear and to eat 
and drink, why, I shall soon lose my cough and get my 
looks back — I’m only nine-and twenty, after all.’ 

Jenny’s voice was slightly unsteady. There were tears 
in it, though she smiled. 

1 You d-don’t understand/ stammered Colthurst, in 
terrible perplexity. Revolt, rebellion, defiance, would have 
been easier to deal with than this. 

4 Why, why, surely/ she went on, gently, 4 1 ain’t so 
changed as all that ? And you’d have no trouble to get 
younger models for heads and hands and so on, now you 
can afford to pay them. They’d be glad enough to be taken 


The Wages of Sm. 


184 

up by a man with a name like you. As to feet, well, 
upon my word, there’s no model in London, not even 
Annie Sutton, or that little Italian Giacomelli girl Walter 
Creighton’s always painting, can beat me for feet.’ 

Colthurst was silent. Her voice became very unsteady 
again. 

' 1 should do as well as the lay figure, any way for the 
clothes and drapery,’ she said. 'You know how I can 
stand, Jim, by the hour together-^and things look so 
woodeny on the figure — I should do for that.’ 

Colthurst stood biting his moustache. * Let us sit 
d-d own and talk it all out quietly, Jenny,’ he said at last. 
' 1 b-began at the wrong end of my story, I’m afraid, and 
misled you. You don’t understand. I want to explain 
the practical, common-sense part of it to you.' 

Jenny scrutinized him searchingly for a moment. Then 
she flung herself down in the leather-covered arm-chair 
by the fire-place. The sunset light had faded from the 
sky, and in the grey uncertainty of the dusk, the room 
looked meaner and uglier, and the woman, checked in the 
midst of her generous fresh enthusiasm, looked gaunt and 
old. 

'Go on, Jim, then,’ she said, curtly. 'Explain.’ 

But it was just all Colthurst could do, under the cir- 
cumstances, to explain. 

' I have taken a studio down in Kensington/ he said. 
'It is large. It has two fire-places in it, so that if I 
carry out my plan of getting a few students to work under 
me, I could put up a partition for a time, and shut off a 
portion of it for myself, till I could afford to build. They 
could work in the larger half of it, and •’ 

' You mean to live down there,’ interrupted Jenny 
Parris. 

Colthurst heard his own heart beat in the pause before 
he answered. — ' Yes/ he said. And the word seemed to 
him to drop like a stone into a black, deep well. 

Jenny sat very still for a few seconds. 

' I shall be sorry/ she said, slowly, looking steadily at 
him, ' to leave Mrs. Prust. She’s a good, kind creature, 
and the old gentleman’s wonderfully fond of Dot.’ 

' I d-didn’t propose that you should leave Mrs. Prust at 


The Drag on the Wheel \ 


185 


present/ Colthurst turned and glanced out of the window, 
along the curve of the dreary street. ‘ There would be 
hardly proper accommodation for you and Dot. There 
are only three rooms, besides the offices, attached to the 
studio.’ 

4 I’ve lived in two rooms for a good number of years 
now,’ she replied, quietly, * excepting when I’ve lived in 
one. You needn’t be so tremendously considerate of my 
comfort, Jim. I’m not too particular. I could manage — 
for a time — till you can afford to build — as you say — till 
then, you know.’ 

Then Colthurst grew a little mad. It is such situations 
as this which push even good-hearted and conscientious 
men into cruelty, into crime even. But one idea, that of 
self-preservation — which meant the preservation of his 
genius unshackled, of the possibility of carrying out his 
convictions and great purposes unhindered — was upon 
him. He came across from the window and stood in front 
of her. 

1 Is it conceivable,’ he asked, 1 that you don't recognize 
that you and the child being there would simply ruin me ? 
It could not be kept dark. Every one must see, every 
one must know it. Just the people I most want to get 
hold of would resent it most hotly ; would consider it an 
unpardonable scandal and outrage. Are you to open the 
door to my sitters ? Am I to risk their running over Dot 
ballet-dancing to a barrel-organ on the doorstep ? Don't 
you see that it’s out of the question, unpermissible, 
absurd?* 

Jenny Parris rose to her feet. She was trembling so 
violently that she had to catch hold of the corner of the 
chimney-piece for support . — 1 My God 1 after all these 
years, you’re not going to cast us off, Jim ? ’ she cried. 

* Cast you off — what have I ever said about casting you 
off? Of course not. You shall have your allowance, and 
I’ll settle just as usual with Mrs. P-prust. And, when I 
can, I'll come, as I have to-day, and see you.’ 

Jenny put up both hands and thrust back her hair. 

1 Oh ! it’s not the money, it’s not the vile, wretched 
money I want,’ she cried, passionately. ‘Do you think 
thirty shillings a week and the lodgings’ll pay me for my 


Th e Wages of Sin . 


1 86 

happiness and my health and my good name ? There's 
only one way to pay me for mun, Jim, and you know that. 
And you've promised me, scores and scores of times over. 
Make an honest woman of me, Jim, and save the child 
from shame, and give her a chance. She’s your own 
flesh and blood, Jim. And somebody’s told her, or she 
guesses. She’s as sharp as a needle. Oh ! she's a 
wicked little thing ! You heard the way she threw off at 
me about those flowers.’ 

Jenny came closer to him, her face working with strong 
emotion, all blanched, distorted, ghastly, in the chill evening 
dimness. She laid her hand imploringly on his arm. — ‘As 
you’ll have to answer for your deeds one day before God 
Almighty 

Colthurst instinctively tried to shake himself free — to 
draw back. 

‘Yes,’ she repeated, wildly, ‘as you’ll have to answer 
then — now, before it’s too late — before success and money 
and fine company have turned your head — before you’ve 
lost all your liking for me — before — before you’ve lost 
your heart, Jim, to some of those grand ladies that pet 
you, and flatter you, and crack you up — marry me, Jim — 
marry me — there isn’t a woman among them all ’ud ever 
be the wife to you I’d be.’ 

Jenny put both hands on his shoulders. 

‘ Why, Jim, Jim 1 ’ she cried, with heartbreaking earnest- 
ness, ‘ don’t you understand you’re just everything in the 
wide world to me ? I love you, man ' 

She paused, her speech broken by a gasping sob. 

‘ I love you now as I loved you when we loitered in the 
combes above dear old Beera, in the evenings, years ago ; 
and heard the gulls laugh and the pheasants call, and the 
breeze slip up through the tops of the oak wood, and the 
beat of the surf on the bar across the bay, and the cry of 
the men and the rattle of the cable, when the skiffs came 
in and took up their moorings back of the pier, waiting for 
the tide to bring ’em in to quay.’ — Jenny let her hands 
drop at her sides, and tossed her head back with a sudden, 
sobbing laughter. — ‘You know what’s happened since. 
Luck’s been against us, and times bad. But I love you, Jim,’ 
she said, ‘I loveyou; that’s all. There’s nothing more to say.’ 


The Drag on the Wheel . 


i8 7 


But, alas ! from Colthurst’ s point of view there was 
much, everything more to say. On the one hand was this 
woman’s affection for him and his obligation to her — an 
obligation which he knew he was discharging at least as 
fully as most men discharge such obligations. On the 
other hand was his career, his mission, his unsatisfied rage 
of living, and the haunting aching sweetness of a pure 
and ideal love. Must he sacrifice all these to poor Jenny 
Parris ? 

And it must be remembered that Colthurst knew the 
worst as well as the best of her. Knew her loyalty, her 
outbursts of unselfish devotion ; but knew equally her hot 
temper, her jealousy, her radical incapacity for the strain 
of a well-ordered manner of daily living, knew the element 
of coarseness in her nature, knew her light-mindedness 
and vanity, knew her want of tact, knew her recklessness 
when in good spirits and her general unmanageableness 
when in bad. Knew that this impulsive, half-educated 
woman could never become a real companion and help- 
meet to him, could never take her place in the social 
circles in which he intended to move ; knew that she was 
incapable of helping him forward, supporting him, climbing 
upward by his side. Earlier she might, perhaps, have 
done so, for there had been a singular quickness and 
adaptability in her ; but it had given way under the hard 
and demoralizing conditions of her position. 

All this Colthurst knew. Let us be just to him. And 
it was not only this, for he had a more bitter complaint 
against poor Jenny than any of these — a complaint which 
he tried never to formulate, even in silence, it filled him 
with such loathing and disgust. He had hoped it might 
lie buried for ever out of sight and remembrance ; but now, 
in his excitement and perplexity, now in his growing fear 
— fear that the woman would soften him, get her own way, 
and so keep him for ever enslaved — now, in his extremity, 
he turned and struck her with the hideous weapon with 
which she, unhappy yet — in a sense, for we must be just 
all round — heroic soul, had by her own action furnished 
him. 

‘ Jenny/ he stammered, under his breath, 'I can’t 
marry you. You remember that time, three years ago. 


88 


The Wages of Sin, 


in P — Paris. You know what I mean. That was too 
much. I can’t marry you. You know why.’ 

Colthurst was pale, too. They were very terrible, those 
two white, human faces, close together, looking into each 
other’s eyes in the dingy London dusk, a knowledge 
between them of something too pitiful, too vile to put into 
words. 

If, in speaking, Colthurst had anticipated an outbreak 
of denunciation, he was mistaken. Jenny took a long, 
choking breath, closed her lips rigidly, drawing herself 
up to her full height. She was nearly as tall as Colthurst. 
Now, in the growing obscurity, she seemed to loom up 
before him, a grand, dark, tragic figure, wrapped about by 
the solemnity of an unalleviable woe. 

‘You can go, Jim,’ she said. ‘We’ve had it all out 
now. I know what you mean. You know why I did it. 
I couldn’t let you and the child starve.’ 

‘ Better have let us starve ten times over than keep us 
alive at the price of such shame,’ he answered. 

‘Would you have said so then?’ — Jenny put the 
question with a queer mixture 'of avidity and mockery. 

‘Yes, you know I should,’ Colthurst answered, very 
quietly, ‘ if you had given me the chance.' 

Again love triumphed in Jenny. — ‘ I’m glad, then,’ she 
said, ‘ I didn’t give you the chance.’ 

There was a brief silence. The woman was the first to 
speak. 

‘You can go, Jim,’ she repeated. ‘We’ve had it all 
out now. You can make your mind easy. I shan’t hang 
about the fine new studio down in Kensington, and put 
your sitters about, and ruin your prospects. Only remem- 
ber this, Jim, if you should happen to take a fancy to one 
of those fine ladies — you said there were women among 
your new friends as well as men — and make up to her, 
and try to marry her, well, I warn you she'll see me first. 
She shall hear the whole story, and then if she likes to 
have you she may.’ 

Jenny moved slowly across the room as she spoke. 
Her knees gave under her, and she laid hold of the 
furniture in passing to steady herself. She sunk down 
911 the hard black horsehair sofa. 


The Drag on the Wheel , 


189 


‘There, go/ she said, ‘go, Jim, like a good fellow. 
I’ve had about enough/ 

Some ten minutes later Mrs. Prust knocked at the door 
with a view to the removal of the tea-tray. This, by rights, 
was numbered among the duties of Serena, the sharp-eyed, 
youthful general-servant of the establishment. And, for 
once, Serena, had displayed alacrity, not to say ardour, in 
her readiness to step upstairs any time during the last hour 
and bring the tray down. But her mistress, with more than 
one cutting remark as to the hatefulness of poking, and 
.prying, and curiosity generally in girls who took no more 
than six pounds a year wages, announced an intention of 
fetching it down herself. In truth the worthy woman was 
bursting with impatience to know the result of the ‘ bilious 
fiend's * visit, and to ascertain whether her lodger’s satanic 
acquaintance had acted on her advice and ‘ looked 
thoroughly into it all.’ 

When Mrs. Prust bustled into the room, Jenny was 
still sitting, dry-eyed, on the hard sofa, in her stained, 
frayed, claret-coloured ulster, her hands lying idle in her 
lap. 

‘ Why, my dear, good soul/ cried the landlady, her 
well-cushioned person coming into sudden and sharp 
collision with the corner of the table, ‘ whatever be think- 
ing of sitting alone in the dark ? You’m mazed, sure-ly ? ’ 

In intimate conversation Mrs. Prust laid aside fash- 
ionable conventionalities of diction, and relapsed into the 
idiom still prevalent in Devon. 

Something in the familiar accent, in the comfortable, 
kindly, fussy presence, touched a very tender chord in 
poor Jenny Parris’s battered heart. — ‘ Oh, Mrs. Prust ! ’ 
she said, ‘ let the tea-things bide and come here. Sit down 
by me a bit, and give me your hand. I’m in deep waters, 
the floods have gone over me.’ 

She stopped abruptly, interrupted by a fit of cough- 
ing, which shook her strong frame painfully. — Mrs. 
Prust, meanwhile, murmuring something profoundly in- 
coherent concerning ‘ poor young things/ ‘ inofiensiveness/ 
‘Old Scratch/ and ‘lozengers/ for one of which objects 
she, at the same time, instituted a vigorous but unsuccess- 
ful search in the pocket of her dress. 


t9° 


The Wages of Sin , 


1 It’ll pass in a minute/ gasped Jenny. * I get it like 
this, often by night.’ — She paused for breath, and then 
continued slowly — * Sometimes I think my time won’t be 
long here.’ 

* There there, now/ said Mrs. Prust, soothingly, 
shocked at this confirmation of her own prognostications. 
* My dear soul, don’t be fretting about such things as 
that.’ 

* But I don’t think it will/ Jenny repeated. 4 When I 
feel like I do to-night, I should be more glad than sorry 
to know I should go soon. It’s a cruel, bad world, Mrs. 
Prust. And see here, I won’t deceive you. I’ve been no 
better than I should. I ain't what’s called a respectable 
woman. I’ve gone pretty low. But don’t turn me out, 
Mrs. Prust, there’s a good, kind body. Help me a bit. 
Not with money/ she added, under a swift fear of mis- 
conception ; 1 1 shall have enough, some way or other, of 
that. But help me with the child. She’s fond of the 
Cap’n, and he’s good to her. If I go, you’ll remember her, 
won’t you — she’s got no friends but you — and not lose 
sight of my poor little maid ? ’ 

The landlady pressed her hand in silence, save for a 
gurgling and choking, very really, if inelegantly, indicative 
of sympathy. At last she quavered out — ‘ Don't you 
werry, my dear. While I’m above ground she’ll want 
for nothing. And I must say, even when most irritable, 
Cap’n Prust’s as set as never was on little Dot.’ 


Chapter III. 

Early in December it happened that Professor Sylvester, 
the Royal Academician who presided over the Connop 
Trust School, fell ill. He caught a bad bronchitic cold ; 
stayed at home, went to bed and got up again fully per- 
suaded of the necessity of passing the remainder of the 
winter in Sicily, or at all events on the Riviera. Good 
Mr. Barwell, the under-master, meanwhile, was far from 
enjoying his hour of supreme command. Not that he 
grumbled at the increase of work it brought him ; but that 


The Drag on the Wheel. 


191 

his modest soul was harassed by conscientious fears of 
the inadequacy of his own powers. He trembled lest 
the school should suffer. In moving terms he im- 
plored the School Council to come to the rescue, 
and rig up a mock sun of some description, until 
such time as the legitimate Royal Academic rays 
should again pour their cheering influences upon the sixty 
and odd students now under his sole tuition. But at such 
short notice even a mock sun was not easily procurable, 
every painter of standing being fully occupied with his 
own pictures for the spring exhibitions. Adolphus Carr, 
deputed thereto by his fellow council-men, proceeded from 
studio to studio in vain ; and the last day of term drew in 
sight with Mr. Barwell, still revolving in unilluminated 
loneliness, wringing his hands. 

It was at one of Mr. Carr’s Wednesday afternoon 
parties that Colthurst first heard of the dilemma in which 
the Connop School found itself. Colthurst had a standing 
invitation to these parties, and during the last six weeks 
had availed himself pretty frequently of it. Not that his 
love of society had suffered any appreciable increase ; but 
that at Mr. Carr’s there was always a chance of meeting 
Miss Crookenden, and to meet Miss Crookenden again 
was a growing desire with him. An impression may be 
strong, but, almost in proportion to its strength, it craves 
for renewal, for the satisfaction of contact with that which 
produced it. 

And to-day, it seemed, fortune was disposed to smile on 
Colthurst, and grant him the renewal he desired. For on 
entering the first of Mr. Carr’s suite of handsome rooms — 
that gentleman occupied a very good flat in one of the 
large red mansions that have sprung up of late years along 
the western portion of the Embankment — one of the first 
persons he remarked was Madame Jacobini. She was 
ensconced on a sofa, just by a wide, elaborately-draped 
doorway. Her eyebrows were elevated, her plain, clever 
face full of expression — she had on a black bonnet with 
dash of yellow in it which suited her admirably — and 
her hands were busy in gesticulation as she conversed 
vivaciously with Mr. Clement Bartlett, whose playing of 
Captain Dulcimer, in ‘A Quarter to Eight,’ triumphantly 


192 


Tht Wages of Sin. 


justifies — so say his many friends — the high opinion they 
have always expressed regarding his dramatic talent. It 
is unsympathetic, it comes near being discourteous, to 
differ from your friends in opinion. Mr. Bartlett was 
guilty of no such discourtesy. His own opinion confirmed 
that of his friends, confirmed it really generously. With 
the result that, just now, he presented to Colthurst the 
spectacle of a supremely self-complacent back. 

Mr. Carr, meanwhile, standing at the entrance of his 
dim, crowded, carefully lighted, luxuriously-furnished 
apartment, immediately after greeting his newly-arrived 
guest, embarked in a recital of the woes of the Connop 
School. He was full of the subject, so full that for once 
in his life he overflowed — overflowed to the detriment of 
discretion, which got a lot of the starch washed out of its 
neat, self-respecting, little person in the process. 

1 It really is very much on my mind, Colthurst/ he said, 
with mild seriousness, in his most admirably confidential 
manner. ( I volunteered at the last Council meeting to do 
my best to secure a locum tenens. I have been very much 
interested in the school from the first, you know. I have 
the honour of being one of the trustees of the Connop 
Trust, and I have always been most anxious that the 
schools benefiting by the endowment should maintain a 
high standard, and offer a solidly good artistic education/ 

I They are less r-rutted in prejudice than the Govern- 
ment schools — one can say that for them without hesita- 
tion/ Colthurst put in. 

* Ah ! I am glad you think so P 

Even Colthurst’s complimentary speeches appeared to 
Mr. Carr suggestive of sudden and involuntary collision 
with some hard and very angular object. Colthurst in 
conversation affected his mind as driving over a jolting 
road would have affected his body. Mr. Carr paused a 
moment, and drew one lady-like hand down over the back 
of his head to soothe his jarred nerves. 

I I really have taken a very great deal of trouble in 
this matter of a locum tenens . I was perfectly ready to 
do so ; but I must confess the result has been discourag- 
ing, almost annoying to me. It has been an unpleasant 
revelation to me of the lack of public spirit — I must say 


The Drag on the Wheel. 


193 


so — among the professional brotherhood, Colthurst. One 
man after another has refused. And it is most embarrass- 
ing, really anything but pleasant, to meet with a series of 
refusals. But this morning I thought my vexations were 
at an end — that I had secured Walter Creighton. I ought 
not to say that he actually bound himself by a promise ; 
but his tone was most encouraging. I have just received 
this telegram from him.’ — Mr. Carr held the square of 
pink paper by one corner, and tapped it reproachfully with 
his forefinger . — 1 He says, “ Extremely sorry, but find it 
impossible on further consideration to undertake work.” ' 

' 1 don’t know that Creighton's teaching would have 
b-benefited your students very much. He is hopelessly 
hide-b-bound by the great classic superstition,’ Colthurst 
said, while his eyes roved restlessly over the company 
assembled. 

— There was Mrs. Frank Lorimer, all innocence, and 
in an irreproachable gown from Paris. There was Antony 
Hammond’s neat, beardless face, increasingly rotund 
person, and air of studied yet invincibly easy good- 
humour. There was Miss Dampier, bright-eyed, high- 
coloured, in general effect like an aged gossamer, undulat- 
ing with admiration in front of Caminada, the new tenor. 
How sincerely Colthurst did not like that expansive 
spinster ! He hoped to goodness she might have no 
opportunity of undulating in front of him before the after- 
noon was over. — 

1 Ah ! I think you are always inclined to be rather hard 
on Creighton,’ Mr. Carr rejoined, suavely, remonstrant, 
and very sensible of another jolt. 'Like most ultra- 
Liberals, you know, you exhibit decided traces of illibe- 
rality in some directions, Colthurst. No one so autocratic 
as the Socialist — you must pardon my saying so— at heart. 
Now you cannot deny Creighton’s drawing is fine— very 
fine. Of course, I grant you he is decorative, a little too 
much led away by his taste — and a most refined and ex- 
quisite taste it is— for decoration.’ 

' He has never p-painted a picture in his life as far as I 
know, only fitted figures and accessories into many feet of 
canvas, as you might fit a pattern on so many yards of 
calico, taking care to fill up the corners nicely.’ 


0 


194 


The Wages of Sin. 


Mr. Carr shifted his position slightly. His conversa- 
tional spine really quite ached from the jolts. He sheered 
off from the apparently rather dangerous subject of Mr. 
Creighton, taking refuge in the superficially safer one of 
the masterless condition of the Connop School. 

* It is a pity Mr. Barwell is so diffident. You know 
him ? Excellent man, most amiable and painstaking. I 
have the highest respect for him ; but his want of self- 
confidence amounts to a misfortune — a positive misfortune 
in the present case. For I believe, myself, he is perfectly 
competent to carry on the school single-handed for a few 
weeks. You see, happily, there is no question of resigna- 
tion on Sylvester’s part. I have no doubt we shall have 
him back after Easter, possibly sooner. We merely 
require a stop-gap.’ 

Colthurst’ s eyes still roamed restlessly over the dimly 
bright rooms. — There were Mrs. Carmichael and her 
two handsome, well-groomed daughters. The younger 
one was laughing a little, trying hard not to laugh too 
much — though she has such pretty teeth — at something 
Mr. Evershed — he is a clerk in the Home Office — was 
telling her. There was Horatio Deland, the thought- 
reader, too, whose lank black hair and rather verdant 
complexion are so uncomfortably suggestive of a rough 
Channel crossing. He was talking to Miss Hattie White, 
the smart little American who plays the banjo. — 

* 1 have applied to every one I think the least likely to 
help us,’ Mr. Carr added. 1 1 really am at a loss to know 
what further steps to take. This telegram is very annoy- 
ing — very. — Ah ! Duckingfield, how d’ye do ? Delighted 
to see you. I was just telling Colthurst about our diffi- 
culties at the Connop School. Walter Creighton ’ 

But the repetition of Mr. Carr’s wbes was lost upon 
Colthurst, for at last Miss Crookenden had come into 
sight. The young lady emerged from the dining-room 
and advanced slowly across the inner drawing-room. 
She had a tea-cup in her hands, and Colthurst judged it 
must be somewhat over-full from the careful way she 
carried it. The centre of the room happened to be 
vacant just then ; he consequently had an uninterrupted 
view of her. Her close-fitting blue-gray gown, bordered 


The Drag on the Wheel ’ 


195 


with beaver, was stiff in front from throat to hem with 
silver embroidery. Her shadowed fair hair was sur- 
mounted by a hat or bonnet — it would be presumptuous 
to specify which — blue and silver too, the distinct form of 
it not unlike that of a little winged helmet. Arrayed in 
this suit of fairy-like armour, Mary Crookenden appeared 
even more than usually seductive. Her moonlight beauty 
gained a certain dainty edge, a hint of delicate audacity 
from her costume. She was lovely, and there was a sort 
of challenge — refined, but .very sufficiently provoking to 
the spectator — in her loveliness. 

Beside her was a man whom Colthurst did not know, 
but whom he perceived to possess all the unconscious 
insolence which comes of very good breeding. He was 
tall and slight. His neck was rather too long, and his 
shoulders sloped rather too much. He must have been 
over forty. He had a remarkably beautiful mouth. Ap- 
parently he found favour in Miss Crookenden’s sight, for 
she talked to him quite gaily as she came slowly down the 
length of the room. Apparently he found favour in 
Madame Jacobini’s sight also, for she welcomed him with 
one of her widest and most genial smiles as he offered 
her cream-jug and sugar-basin to complete the joys of the 
cup of tea Miss Crookenden had brought her. Self- 
complacency meanwhile, became less aggressively evident 
in the general expression of Mr. Bartlett’s person. His 
glory seemed to wane slightly under the almost pedantic 
courtesy of the other man’s bearing. 

As Colthurst watched the little group his spirits did not 
rise. He had his desire. There was Miss Crookenden 
sure enough — Miss Crookenden animated, gracious, gay, 
her graceful figure thrown into high relief by the massive 
russet draperies of the doorway behind her, her silvery 
breastplate as she moved giving off scintillations of white 
light. She had never looked more engaging, but never, 
alas ! seemed more inaccessible, further away. For 
Colthurst recognised, more clearly than he had ever done 
before, how she was hedged about by wealth ; by the 
pretty queenship of her acknowledged beauty ; and by 
those unwritten laws of social privilege which in theory 
he so despised, but which in practice he had to admit 

o 2 


196 


The Wages of Sin. 


are so tyrannically potent in the ordinary conduct of life, 
/nd then he asked himself savagely to which world he 
really belonged — which for him held the final and perma- 
nent issues in its grasp. — The world of Mary Crookenden, 
proud and brilliant as she looked in her suit of fairy-mail, 
unassailable in the bravery of her spotless maidenhood ? 
Or the world of Jenny Parris — Jenny, worn and degraded 
— Jenny, in her soiled, stylish ulster, with its frayed cuffs 
and missing buttons — Jenny, pitiful, though in a way 
splendid, wreck of unruly passion and of sin ? The 
question was a hard one, and Colthurst was over-worked 
and harassed. He answered it in a pessimistic spirit. He 
was penetrated by a sullen conviction that the final issues 
would be cruel — that they would prove evil, not good. 

But that conviction — since, while life and reason are 
whole in us, we all, by inherent necessity, try to restore 
the balance and failing one mode of consolation take 
refuge in some other with ingenious haste — that only 
threw Colthurst back upon the fixed idea of his great 
artistic propaganda. If in some directions the roads were 
blocked, if in some departments he was foredoomed to 
sorrow, then the success of his work, the promulgation of 
his artistic gospel became indeed of infinite moment to 
him. It was all he had left. More than ever he thirsted 
for the satisfaction of making it obtain and prevail. And 
then suddenly his recent conversation with Adolphus 
Carr presented itself to him in a new light. Here was an 
opportunity of preaching his gospel ready to hand. — His 
spirits rose. His decision was swift. If the Council 
would appoint him, he would take the place of the dis- 
abled professor of the Connop School himself. 1 Barwell 
might be a little scared, but he wouldn’t offer any opposi- 
tion. And it would be delicious,’ he said to himself, 
1 delicious to plant the standard of revolt right there, in 
the heart of the enemy's camp.’ — He turned hastily, an 
alacrity in his manner, to broach the subject to Mr. Carr. 

But that gentleman was busy greeting a fresh influx of 
guests. Colthurst had moved aside absently, in his 
desire to get as complete a view as might be of Mary 
Crookenden ; and now he discovered he had landed him- 
self in a corner, that he was hemmed in between the end 


The Brag on the Wheel . 


197 


of a grand piano and the rather excessive developments 
of a highly ornate fireplace, while a small army of well 
and ill-dressed backs intervened between him and his host. 

The nearest of the said backs belonged to Antony 
Hammond; and Colthurst, I am afraid, was disposed to 
be rather uncharitable towards that agreeably good- 
tempered minor poet, as towards all persons who ven- 
tured to regard life from a facile, light-hearted point of 
view. In his present humour, half-morbid, half-ardent, 
Hammond’s attitude of permanent amusement was any- 
thing but sympathetic to him ; and to avoid being com- 
pelled to address him, he moved still further into the 
semi-obscurity of the corner. But the corner was a small 
one. He could not help overhearing a good deal that was 
said. 

And as usual, Hammond had plenty to say. He was 
particularly happy, for he had just encountered a friend 
of very long standing who was an extremely attractive 
woman to boot. Some circumstances, moreover, con- 
nected with her piqued Hammond’s curiosity shrewdly ; 
and the gratification of his curiosity was to Hammond, it 
must be owned, an inexhaustible source of entertainment 
He was the least snubbable of men. He proposed to 
permit himself the indulgence of asking two or three 
questions. 

1 This is delightful ! ’ he exclaimed ; 1 as delightful as it 
is amazing. What has procured us this honour ? What 
has induced you to visit our sublunary sphere, Lady 
Calmady ? But that I have this moment had the privi- 
lege of shaking your hand, and that I found it reassur- 
ingly substantial and resistant, 1 should be tempted to 
believe myself in the presence of one of those astral 
bodies Horatio Deland has been descanting on at such 
desolating length. Will no philanthropic soul catch that 
poor demented being and clap him into a lunatic asylum ? 
He really is not fit to go about loose. He is more 
tedious than a debate on the Irish Question, a missionary 
sermon, or a cold in one’s head. But to return to this 
delightful surprise you have given us — from whence, my 
dear Lady Calmady, and for how long ? 9 

However much Colthurst might be absorbed in per- 


198 


The Wages of Sin. 


sonal matters, it was impossible to him to be ignorant of 
his surroundings. His brain was a sensitive plate which 
could not but receive and retain pretty vivid images of all 
presented to his eyes. Moreover the name Hammond 
used, arrested his attention. For he had heard — who 
indeed has not ? — of the strangely romantic marriage 
made some years ago by the lady now bearing it. A 
marriage so strange in some of its aspects, that a vast 
number of people have asserted that no one but a not 
very nice woman could ever have had the courage to 
make it at all. There was an element of weirdness in it 
such as appealed strongly to Colthurst’s imagination. He 
glanced at Lady Calmady with a quickening of interest ; 
and the impression he received was a distinctly un- 
common one. For, to put it concisely, now, as when 
some twenty years ago Sir Richard Calmady first had the 
extreme good fortune to meet her, she suggested a 
singularly enchanting cross between a Greek nymph, a 
Scotch deerhound, and a very well-bred Eton boy. 

‘ I came up from Brockhurst this morning/ she said, in 
answer to Hammond's question. * I go down to-morrow 
by the four o’clock. I was forced to come up — at least 
my maid told me I was — to do some shopping. And as I 
was passing I thought I would just look in and see how 
you were all getting on.' 

‘Oh, we are all trotting down the inevitable way in 
much the same order as of old/ he rejoined lightly ; 
* some trot faster than others, and that usually rather 
against their will, I fancy. Carr, perhaps, keeps as even 
and moderate a pace as any. But we all trot.' 

Lady Calmady had seated herself sideways on the arm 
of an easy chair. Her attitude perhaps was slightly un- 
conventional She lolled; but she lolled as a long-limbed, 
delicately-made lad lolls, or as Daphne may have lolled by 
the reed-grown banks of Peneus irf Thessaly, ere the god 
loved, and pursued, and for ever lost her amid the green 
leaves of the sweet-scented thickets of myrtle. As 
Hammond spoke she smiled, and her smile held a very 
noble revelation of character. Her upper lip shortened, 
her eyes narrowed a little and quickened into wonderful 
sweetness and tenderness of expression. The faithful- 


The Drag on the Wheel. 


199 


ness, the pathos, the finely-tempered strength ot this 
woman’s nature manifested themselves with a radiant 
directness in her smile. 

1 Ah, that trotting ! ’ she exclaimed ; 1 it's a nuisance, 
isn’t if ? Yes, we all trot, more’s the pity. For my part 
I don’t care to talk about it.' 

Hammond whirled the string of his eye-glass round his 
finger. He was charmed. 

* The situation remains unchanged then ? You are not 
in the least bored yet then ? ’ he permitted himself to say. 

A shade of displeasure crossed Lady Calmady’s face. 
But Hammond was an old friend ; and then too his im- 
perturbable good-temper obtained him pardon for many 
speeches that trod rather hard on the heels of imperti- 
nence. Lady Calmady’s upper lip shortened, and the 
clear sky shone out again in her beautiful smile. 

* Dick and I are as great fools as ever, thank God,’ she 
said, quietly. 1 And so I can’t but be sorry for the trot- 
ting. When the present is full of content, as good as it 
well can be, the slowest pace seems a lot too fast.’ 

Hammond looked at her in silence for a moment. And 
his thoughts wandered away to a certain slim, upright 
maiden lady nearing middle age, who wears out level, 
uneventful days among learned books and small inglorious 
duties in a reposeful country rectory. Even the most 
mercurial of mortals have their moments of insight and 
consequent twinges of regret. 

1 Ah, you blissful married people ought to be put a stop 
to somehow,’ he cried, almost impatiently. * You make 
the rest of us feel so abominably dissatisfied at times. 
It really is very difficult to forgive you, for you produce 
in one the detestable suspicion that one may after all 
have missed the very heart of the whole matter.’ 

And Colthurst, leaning his elbow on the end of the 
grand piano, alone as you can only be alone somehow in 
a crowd, gazed ofit of his dark corner sadly enough. For 
Hammond’s tone had a ring of sincerity in it which made 
Colthurst feel quite amiably towards him for once, and 
pardon him those cheerful, futile, gnat-like dancings up 
and down in the social sunbeams which generally struck 
him as so irritating. 


200 


The Wages of Sin. 


1 Poor little Dot ! ’ he said to himself, suddenly inconse- 
quently. ‘ Poor little Dot ! ’ — But his mood hardened again 
almost immediately. Ambition gained over sentiment . — ‘ Art 
remains/ he went on. And his mind turned longingly in the 
direction of those sixty and odd professorless students at 
the Connop Trust School .— 1 Even in one term I might do a 
good deal, might sow seed it would not. be easy to root out.' 

He drew himself up, again looking for Adolphus Carr. 
It would be best to speak to him at once, and then depart. 
What was the use of lounging here, exciting, provoking 
himself by the contemplation of Mary Crookenden, her 
splendours and successes ? 

Unfortunately, Mr. Carr was otherwise engaged, not to 
be had. Assiduous, confidential, he was occupied in con- 
ducting the steps of Lady Theodosia. Pringle, and those 
of her amiable, anxious, squat-figured, elderly daughter in 
the direction of refreshments. These two ladies are a 
stable quantity at a certain section of London entertain- 
ments, and Colthurst knew them well by sight. No one 
pursues her social duties with more praiseworthy perti- 
nacity than Lady Theodosia. But providence has seen 
fit, in its inscrutable wisdom, to deny her a large income. 
She therefore pursues them gallantly on foot ; unless the 
weather is phenomenally atrocious, when she has been 
known reluctantly to bestow her alert and upright person 
in an omnibus. She, consequently, habitually arrives at 
her destination furnished with a healthy appetite and a 
pair of questionably clean boots. Colthurst recognised 
that he must resign himself. Lady Theodosia's repast 
would take time. And he did not care to follow his host 
into the dining-room. To do so would oblige him to pass 
close to Miss Crookenden, and to pass her would be to 
speak to her. He did not want to speak to her; he 
wanted, indeed, very honestly to put her altogether out of 
his head. If Naboth’s vineyard can never be yours, is it 
not a palpable folly to hang over the wall of it, and whet 
appetite by plucking here and there a stray grape ? He 
determined to remain where he was until Carr should 
come back. Meanwhile, he fell to planning about the 
Connop School ; even, in imagination, to haranguing its 
sixty and odd students. 


The Drag on the Wheel. 


201 


Unluckily, just as he had warmed up pleasantly to that 
same haranguing, and was cannonading away in denuncia- 
tion, sarcasm, high faith, full-bodied, resonant periods, a 
speech of Lady Calmady’s very effectually claimed his 
attention. She was standing close to him, Hammond 
still beside her. Colthurst could not see her face now ; 
but he could not, however much he might have wished it, 
very well avoid hearing what she said. 

‘ Oh ! that’s Miss Crookenden, is it, talking to Mr. 
Quayle ! That’s interesting. I have heard a good deal 
about her one way and another. She is not quite what I 
had imagined her, though. But then the descriptions from 
which I constructed my idea of her, though highly compli- 
mentary, were, I own, slightly confused.’ — Colthurst felt 
Lady Calmady was smiling. She hesitated a moment, 
and then added : — ‘ Look here, Mr. Hammond, you know 
her, and you hear all that’s said. I don’t ask out of mere 
gossipiness, I think I am justified in asking. Tell me, 
who is she going to marry ? ' 

Hammond had regained all his usual lightness of 
demeanour. 

1 Who indeed ! ’ he exclaimed. 1 There you open up a fine 
field for speculation. The aspirants are as the sands of 
the sea for multitude, and the young lady, though most 
adorable, is also not a little capricious. Heaven forbid I 
should speak disrespectfully of so charming a person. 
Pray understand I report merely in obedience to your 
question. I assert nothing. But the wicked declare she 
is rather addicted to the pastime of taking scalps, which 
is our refined modern way of putting the old formula, 
breaking hearts.’ 

' Ah ! I am sorry for that,’ Lady Calmady said softly. 

' Never having been guilty in that line yourself,’ put in 
Hammond gaily. 1 Well, the last victim who has under- 
gone the small operation I have just alluded to is poor 
little Sir Theophilus O’Grady. You know him ? Not an 
impressive figure, yet I really was stirred to compassion 
for him three days ago, when I found him at the club, 
biting his nails down to the quick with rage and wretched- 
ness, because, after smiling encouragingly upon him 
through last season, our young lady had just flatly refused 


202 


The Wages oj Sin. 


under any conceivable circumstances to share his patri- 
monial peat bog and chances of being shot by a loyal and 
devoted tenantry. As for the others, I myself, Lady 
Calmady, have trembled more than once on the edge of 
the abyss. Even our honoured host is declared by some 
to have had his hours of delirium in which he contem- 
plated the immolation of a happy and honourable 
bachelorhood on the altar of matrimony. Mr. Quayle’s 
attitude, I think, speaks for itself, I may spare myself the 
exertion of dilating on it.’ 

Hammond, here, permitted himself a pause and brief 
inspection of Lady Calmady’s countenance. He had a 
theory that no woman, be her marriage ever so happy a 
one, quite relishes the spectacle of a former worshipper 
paying court to another and younger than herself ; and 
that romantic passages took place long ago between his 
companion and the gentleman he had just mentioned is a 
matter of history. I am delighted to say Hammond's 
theory received no additional confirmation on the present 
occasion, though. He was almost provoked. Lady 
Calmady so very evidently, as he said to himself, ‘ did not 
turn a hair.' 

‘We are further disquieted by rumours of a good- 
looking young country clergyman with prospects. I 
observe his existence is invariably justified by immediate 
allusion to the prospects,' he continued. ‘Then there is 
that estimable, young Samson, the first cousin ’ — 

‘ Ah ! we won't laugh at Lancelot Crookenden, please, 
Mr. Hammond,' Lady Calmady said quietly. ‘ At 
Brockhurst, we are all very fond of him. He is one of 
the very best of good fellows. Behind his silence and 
simplicity there is plenty of character. He rings true, 
absolutely true.’ 

Hammond whirled the silver string of his eyeglass 
round his finger. 

‘ Fortunate youth to have secured such an advocate,’ 
he exclaimed, piously. ‘We can then be in no doubt 
now as to whom Miss Crookenden should marry. Yet 
so blind are even the most adorable young ladies, some- 
times, to their own highest good, that I fear your original 
question as to whom she will marry is nearly as far from 


The Drag on the Wheel. 


203 


being answered as ever, Lady Calmady— especially if she 
has, as the wicked assert, that little weakness for scalps. 
But she seems to be moving. Will you let me have 
the privilege of presenting her to you? Shall we 
come ? ’ 

Colthurst, penned in his corner, had found the above 
conversation anything but flattering to his self-esteem. He 
called Miss Crookenden by the hard name of coquette. He 
suffered a movement of — in his own opinion — very righteous 
anger against her. For in that half- fanatical egotism of 
his, he accused her of having seduced him from the 
straight path of his own most sacred convictions. Had 
he not pledged himself to preaching the average, and was 
, not Miss Crookenden about as far from an embodi- 
ment of the average as need be ? She belonged to 
that small minority to whom this world offers a 
playground, not a workshop. She was — I quote his 
rather extravagant form of statement — a mere foam bell 
on the crest of the wave of artificial civilization. She 
was a decorative adjunct, nothing more. The underlying 
Jacobinism in Colthurst took fire. He greatly questioned 
whether a merely decorative human being is not worse 
than a superfluity, namely an iniquity ; whether a creature 
at once so expensive — you had only to glance at Miss 
Crookenden to assure yourself that she represented an 
uncommon amount of expense — and so useless, ought to 
be permitted to exist at all. It required no effort of the 
intelligence to see she was lovely and be moved by her 
loveliness. Had he not just heard the extensive list of 
her admirers ? They were not, to his thinking, persons 
endowed with any astonishing degree of mental capacity. 
Colthurst began to rate himself for having behaved both 
faithlessly by his creed and unworthily by his intelligence, 
in having yielded so readily to her charm, in having so 
persistently entertained the thought of her. — But there 
was his host back again at last, having succeeded in 
appeasing the pangs of Lady Theodosia’s hunger. Colt- 
hurst emerged from the obscurity of his corner. 

‘ L-look here, Carr/ he said, stammering a good deal 
in his eagerness. * I have been thinking over that difficulty 
of yours about the Connop School. I am willing to 


undertake it myself. You may t-tell the Council so. If 
they choose to offer me the post, I will accept it. And 
supposing any d-difhculty arises as to terms, as to the 
payment of a substitute, I am prepared to give my services. 
I don't think Sylvester’s illness ought to be a tax on the 
school. If he claims the whole of his salary, I will waive 
the question of remuneration.’ 

Alas ! poor Adolphus, wl at unlooked-for pitfalls beset 
the path of even the most diplomatic of men ! For Mr. 
Carr had recounted his woes in all innocence, never 
dreaming that the recital of them would provoke this 
rejoinder. It had not occurred to him to think of Colt- 
hurst as a possible candidate. He had taken for granted 
he was far too busy to be able to afford to offer himself as 
a stopgap. Consequently the proposal took him wholly 
by surprise. Moreover, as Colthurst stood before him, 
dominant, urgent, his eyes with an odd, restless light in 
them, his face with a strange ravaged look on it, even Mr. 
Carr’s polite indirectness gave way. He made a mental 
reflection and that a distinct one. There was a lurid sort 
of splendour of intensity about the man, yet surely 
this was a very singular shepherd to invest with supreme 
authority over that flock of sixty and odd students, male 
and female, at the Connop Trust School ! 

1 Ah ! you are too generous, really too generous, my deai 
Colthurst,’ he said, veiling embarrassment under an excel- 
lently civil show of enthusiasm. 1 Your offer is positively 
princely. — Good-bye, Deland. I hope the seance will go well 
on Friday, and all sceptics be converted. So good of you 
with all your engagements to make time to come. — Yes, 
as I was saying, Colthurst, it is positively princely. At 
the same time you must not be public-spirited to the point 
of forgetting your own interests, you know. In mentioning 
our difficulties I was very far from intending to trade on 
your generosity to this extent.’ 

Which was perfectly true. Mr. Carr passed one lady-like 
hand down over the back of his neatly-curled head. To 
make use of a vulgar expression, he found himself very 
much up a tree. 

' You must not come to a decision in a hurry, you know. — - 
Ah ! Miss White, going ? Well, I am sure we are all deeply 


The Drag on the Wheel. 


205 


in your debt for the pleasure you have given us this after- 
noon. Some of those plantation songs are gems, perfect 
little gems. — Yes, you must consider your own interests, 
my dear Colthurst. The school-work would necessarily 
make heavy inroads upon your time. And with those 
two pictures on hand — most promising powerful pictures 
they are in my opinion ; I have great hopes of them if 
you will allow me to say so — and with that portrait of 
Duckingfield too, you really must think twice before 
encumbering yourself with the Connop School.’ 

'I have thought twice/ Colthurst answered. 1 1 have been 
through all the pros and cons. The pros have it. It just 
amounts to this, Carr, I want immensely to have the school.’ 

Oh ! the joltiness of this conversational road. Our 
discreet, accomplished, elderly Cupid felt sadly shaken. 

* I am sure the Council have reason to be greatly obliged 
to you for your handsome offer/ he remarked a trifle 
vaguely. 

* You will let them know at once ? f 

‘We have a Council meeting to-morrow afternoon at 
which I lay the results of my mission before them/ — Mr. 
Carr passed his hand down over the back of his head 
again thoughtfully . — 1 And I can only repeat that you are 
most generous, Colthurst; but if by chance you should 
happen to see the matter in a different light to-moirov, 
don’t scruple to telegraph. — Ah ! Madame Jacobini, you 
going too? Must you really? I am sorry. Caminada 
has just most kindly consented to sing. I wanted you to 
hear him, and I know he is very anxious for your verdict 
himself’ 

1 Mr. Colthurst/ said Mary Crookenden, in her sweet, 
grave voice ; 1 will you permit me to recall myself to your 
remembrance ? ’ 

The young girl’s proud eyes looked straight into his, 
the fairy armour gleamed and glistened. Colthurst tried 
to harden himself against the charm of this exquisite 
taker of scalps. Tried — yes, it had come to that already. 
Why, in heaven’s name, couldn’t she let him be ? Why 
must she indulge in this wanton bit of coquetry ? He 
asked himself the question with a kind of rage as he 
bowed silently before her. 


206 


The Wages of Sin. 


1 Then certainly I had better depart with all possible 
despatch' — this vivaciously from Madame Jacobini. 'For 
Caminada, poor young man, wouldn’t in the very least 
relish my verdict. I have heard him sing already — went 
through the ordeal a fortnight ago at the Frank Lorimers’. 
Weedy, weedy little voice, Mr. Carr. No substance in it. 
Will never do for the stage, believe me, never.’ 

' I have wished to see you for some time,’ Mary went 
on, with serene gravity. ' I have wished to thank you. 
Probably you have forgotten all about it, but you were 
kind enough to give me some advice when we met abroad 
this summer.’ — She paused in very pretty enquiry. 'You 
may remember ? ’ 

'Yes, I r-remember,’ Colthurst said. 

' You told me to study. I have obeyed you. I am 
studying.’ 

Miss Crookenden’s eyes dilated. Her expression was 
touched with a certain gladness, a certain elevation of 
sentiment. Her fair, young beauty rose into stateliness, 
into something very near grandeur just then. 

'I have never known how much life could be worth before. 

I am very happy, and I am very grateful to you,’ she said. 

' Mary, Mary,’ broke in Madame Jacpbini, huddling her 
furs about her angular shoulders, ' pray come. That 
wretched brougham must have been waiting for hours. 
Pray remember we have to drive home, and dress, and 
dine, and be at the Haymarket by half-past eight.’ 

There was a frost. The horses’ hoofs struck sparks 
from the stones of the crossings. The lamps burnt with 
a small, clear flame. The sky was free of cloud, and the 
stars, keenly bright, sent out sword-thrusts of cold light. 
Colthurst had business at a well-known artist- colour man’s 
in Long Acre. Crossing St. James’s Park, he paused on 
the bridge spanning the ornamental water. The whole 
scene, looking towards the Horse Guards and buildings 
of the Foreign Office, seemed laid in in every shade from 
steel colour, through blue and blue purple to positive 
black. The roar and roll of the streets was loud, culmi- 
nating from time to time in the yell of an out-going or 
in-coming train. A detachment of soldiers marched down 
Bird-cage Walk, the regular tramp of the men forming a 


The Drag on the Wheel. 


207 


ground tone to patter of drum and shrill squeal of fife. 
Some water-fowl on one of the islands awoke, fell into 
commotion and launched forth a noisy fleet, leaving 
diverging trails of whiteness on the surface of the water 
as they swam. And the north wind blew piercing, strong 
and tonic, undefiled by the smoke or human reek of the 
vast city. It rattled the bare, black branches of the trees, 
and struck the iron work of the bridge as with the slap 
of an open hand. 

Colthurst drank it down open-throated. After those 
warm, luxurious, crowded rooms, its chill was very^ wel- 
come. He felt uplifted, strengthened, courageous. It 
came to him as a Wind of Promise out of the infinite 
distances of the dancing, star-scattered, blue- black winter 
night. It told him that the final issues would not be 
cruel, that for him they would not prove evil but good. 
It told him his delicate fancies were rooted in fact, that 
the imagined relation was a real one ; that it was true, 
not false, his words had found entrance and stirred the 
spirit of that fair woman into nobler, fuller life. It might 
suit the purpose of light-minded men to conceive her 
light-minded as themselves. But Colthurst knew better. 
He alone had divined her aright. 

1 Oh ! there is fire/ he said to himself exultantly, going 
back on his old thought of her, 1 plenty of fire underneath 
the snow/ 

The patter of drums and squeal of fifes, the tramp of 
marching feet, died away in the distance. The water- 
fowl, reaching the other shore climbed up with sleepy 
quackings, leaving long bars of rocking, steel-edged 
ripples to mark their track. The four quaiters chimed, 
and then Big Ben boomed out the hour, seven, from the 
Clock Tower. And that strong, clean, untamed wind, a 
wind as it seemed of promise, still rushed out the utter- 
most north, bringing good tidings, bidding fear and dis- 
trust to cease, calling aloud that the world comes round 
to those who can dare even more surely than to those who 
can wait. 

Did the wind lie ? No, for nature never lier. But like 
other oracles, hers, alas ! often bear a hidden meaning, 
and find fulfilment which seems to the seeker sadly 


208 


The Wages of Sin. 


far away from the first-heard plain song of her 
speech. 


Chapter IV. 

Colthurst got the appointment. His offer was accepted 
in courteous terms. He was glad, gratified. The more 
he thought of it, the more it seemed to him this was just 
the opening he needed. Whether, however, his satisfac- 
tion would have been so great had he known the whole 
history of the appointment is doubtful. For the Council 
had not arrived at their decision without perturbation 
and anxious discussions, which were not superabundantly 
complimentary to the subject of them. They had de- 
puted Mr. Carr to find them a convenient King Log. 
They feared he had, in fact, found King Stork, long red 
legs, active bill, and all the rest of it. They hoisted 
danger signals, the older and more conservative among 
them ; spoke of realism, of subversive ideas ; feared Colt- 
hurst was terribly modern, regrettably young; wailed, in 
chorus, that he was guilty of that supremest iniquity in 
the eyes of the respectable English citizens, the iniquity 
of being unmarried. They pointed out, moreover, that 
the conduct and practice of the school had already been 
the subject of criticism and comment on the part of 
persons given, like Dean Swift’s 1 nice man,’ to the enter- 
taining of 1 nasty ideas.’ They foresaw that this appoint- 
ment would give occasion to the enemy, in the form of 
the British Matron, to blaspheme loudly. 

Yet how could they refuse with civility ? How with 
any show of reason find any excuse for declining, while Mr. 
Barwell still continued revolving solitary, wringing his 
hands ? T1 at good man, moreover, in final desperation 
of diffidence had greatly accentuated their .difficulties by 
threatening actual resignation unless a mock-sun of some 
sort was got into working order without further delay. 
To accept King Stork then, or close the school — here were 
the two alternatives. After careful deliberation they 
chose the former. But of all this Colthurst fortunately 
knew nothing. 


The Drag on the Wheel. 


209 


Mr. Barwell’s mild countenance, meanwhile, from out 
its setting of sparse, wavy, gray whisker, appeared to emit 
a gentle radiance. He was immensely relieved. He 
looked like a lean and faithful dog which, after long 
searching, has found its master. There was, if I may 
say so without indelicacy, a distinct effect of tail-wagging 
about him. He was thrilled, too, and fluttered. Nights 
among the flies in the Rhone Valley, days among the 
salvias in the Alpine pastures come back to him. Erro- 
neous principles and diabolic cleverness, to return to the 
phrase of his own particular revered Royal Academician, 
bodily present enthroned, in the heart of his beloved 
Connop School. To Mr. Barwell this was simply tremen- 
dous. He crumpled his long, angular person together on 
the top of the omnibus which would convey him to town, 
outside the semi-detached villa at Hampstead — the parrot- 
nosed sisters watching from the dining-room window, 
over the top of the wire blind — that raw, foggy January 
morning, the first of term, with a sense of positively auda- 
cious adventure, of unlimited intellectual and emotional 
electric shocks ahead. For this estimable man of over 
fifty went forth to meet his new chef as a modest young 
maiden goes forth to meet the lover, of whom, though he 
fascinates her, she is more than half afraid. 

Owing to the atmosphere of uncertainty which had en- 
wrapped the affairs of the school during the vacation, 
there was to be no opening ceremony at the commence- 
ment of term. The Council judged it wisest that King 
Stork should enter upon his career in the frog-pond 
quietly, silently, without preliminary flourish of trumpets. 
Colthurst arrived on the scene early, not caring to run 
against any of the students until he met them in his 
official capacity. He betook himself to the office, a bare 
and businesslike apartment opening on to the flagged 
hall. The Connop School occupies one side of the inner 
quadrangle of the new buildings of the College, the high 
blank back wall of its large drawing theatre being a 
marked feature in the otherwise monotonous uniformity 
of Wentworth Street. The office and hall just 
mentioned are on the first floor, and are approached 
by a rather handsome flight of steps, in the centre of the 


210 


The Wages of Sin . 


facade of the quadrangle on the left. The drawing 
theatre, equal to two stories in height^ is on the ground 
floor ; and in the further corner of the office a door gives 
access to a narrow stone and iron balcony clinging, high 
up, in the inside wall of it. 

Colthurst sat down at the office table. He was con- 
scious of being somewhat nervous and excited. He was 
in little doubt as to the ultimate result of his relation to 
these sixty and odd students. He intended getting very 
complete possession of them; but the process of getting 
must necessarily take time. It could not be done at first 
sight, in a minute. And meanwhile, before the day was 
out he knew he would have to run the gauntlet of a good 
deal of pretty trenchant criticism. Instinctively he steeled 
himself against possible opposition, detraction, even a 
possible flavour of insolence in the bearing of all these 
young strangers. He meant to carry the school ; but the 
half-morbid attitude of his mind made him fancy it more 
than possible he might have to carry it at the point of the 
bayonet. 

The morning grew increasingly foggy. Mr. Barwell, 
armed with the mollifying ointment of his deferential 
manner, came in for brief consultation. The model had 
arrived, so had the greater number of the students. 
But alas ! outer darkness invaded the precincts of the 
theatre. What did Mr. Colthurst think ? It was annoy- 
ing, of course, to be compelled to open proceedings in an 
irregular manner ; annoying that the new director should 
be introduced to the work of the school under other than 
its normal conditions ; still it seemed a pity to waste the 
greater part of the morning waiting on the chance of the 
fog lifting. Would it not be best to decide on a plan of 
operations at once ? Light the gas and give a time- 
sketch ? 

In his present humour, waiting was quite the last thing 
Colthurst cared about. 

‘ I should be uncommonly g-glad to get to work at once/ 
he replied, leaning his elbow on the office table, and look- 
ing up at the tall, amiable, Don-Quixote-like man who 
bent over him — one hand under his coat-tails, the fingers 
of the other thrust in between the buttons of his white 


The Drag on the Wheel . 


21 


waistcoat. For Mr. Barwell, whatever the season of the 
year, invariably marked his sense of the occasion by put- 
ting on a white waistcoat. 

1 1 feel a little like shivering on the b-bank,’ Colthurst 
went on. ‘ I shall be uncommonly glad to get the first 
plunge over — you understand ? Any arrangements you 
can make which will enable me to take the header soon 
and have done with it, will be rather a blessing.’ 

The under-master shuffled off; his countenance still 
emitting a gentle radiance. Outside in the hall, he rubbed 
his lean, long-fingered hands together, with a movement 
of inexpressible satisfaction. He found the contemplation 
of his new chef positively engrossing. — ' He is so 
amazingly alive,’ he said to himself. 1 So amazingly, 
astonishingly alive/ 

Meanwhile Colthurst, to fill up the time and keep his 
sense of nervous impatience within bounds, began read- 
ing through the list of students’ names, lying open on the 
office table. First the tri-weekly ones, mostly ladies, 
none amongst them whom he knew. Then the daily 
students. The names were arranged alphabetically, and 
it so happened that he began at the bottom of the page 
and worked upwards, repeating them mechanically, idly, 
half-aloud . — 1 Eliot, William Jenner — Douglas, Alexander 
— Dicksee, Agnes Kate — Dexter, J. Hablot — Crewdson, 
George Owen/ — And there he stopped. For the letters, 
forming the three words standing on the next line above 
as he glanced at them, performed a queer little war-dance 
right across the page, and when they settled back into 
place again were edged round with half the colours of the 
prism. An excitable brain, such as Colthurst’s, not in- 
frequently plays its possessor these eccentric tricks of 
vision. 

4 Crookenden, Mary Coudert,’ was what he read when 
the words ranged themselves once more in sequence. 

Colthurst was on his feet with a sort of flash. For a 
minute he stood staring at the open list lying on the office 
table. Then he began walking restlessly up and down 
the room with that quick, quiet, cat-like tread of his. 
Truth compels me to state that his first feeling was any- 
thing but an admirable one. It was little more than the 

P 2 


212 


The Wages of Sin. 


alert, savage joy of the hunter who sees the game he has 
long been tracking within easy range at last. The Wheel 
of Fortune as it turned brought about unlooked-for com- 
binations ! He found this fair woman, who had seemed 
so remote, so inaccessible, suddenly by such unlooked-for 
combination given into his hands. He could see her 
every day, speak to her every day. If he was careful, 
watchful, cool enough — and Colthurst just then felt equal 
to anything — he* might develop the fantastic relation he 
believed he had established with her almost indefinitely. 
He might learn by heart, not only the outward aspect of 
the woman, but the aspects of her mind and heart like- 
wise. He might learn the secret of her nature — for each 
nature has its secret, and till you have learnt it your deal- 
ings with that nature are necessarily blundering, bewil- 
dered, superficial, incomplete. Having learnt it he might 
play upon her mind and heart as on some delicate instru- 
ment. He thought of Lady Calmady’s question and 
Hammond’s answer. Thought, exultingly, how deliciously 
chance had given him the whip-hand of all the crowd of 
aspirants to the young lady’s favour. Thought with 
peculiar pleasure of the discomfiture of that insolent, thick- 
witted, young barbarian, Lancelot Crookenden. This 
then was the meaning of the message of the Wind of 
Promise, blowing keen and free from among the dancing 
winter stars out of the blue-black north. 

The fog hung like a rusty curtain of crape against the 
tall office window. The door, already mentioned as lead- 
ing on to the narrow balcony, was ajar. Colthurst could 
hear Mr. Barwell’s voice at intervals issuing civil, apolo- 
getic, conciliatory orders in the theatre below. Could hear 
a scraping of chairs on the boarded floor, a rattle and slam 
of easel-trays let hastily down into place. Then a scurry 
of footsteps across the hall without, echoing on down 
the spiral stone staircase, accompanied by whistlings, 
a laugh, snatches of talk in cheery young baritone voices. 
The opening of a door immediately underneath, a certain 
confused noise caused by this incursion of male students 
into the theatre. 

Almost unconsciously, hearing these things, Colthurst’s 
mood changed. They brought him back to actuality. 


The Drag on the Wheel. 


2I 3 


His movement of blind, unreasoning satisfaction passed. 
His feeling rose to a higher plane. And in that rising the 
inherent dangers and difficulties of his position began to 
reveal themselves. What had he taken the school for ? 
Not to gratify private desires or promote private ends, but 
that he might preach a gospel which he believed to be a 
true and saving one. From this standpoint Miss Crooken- 
den’s presence presented itself less as a triumph than 
as a temptation. The unlooked-for combinations brought 
about by the turning of the Wheel of Fortune were not, 
alas ! without an element of irony. 

1 Carr ought to have warned me/ he said to himself. 
{ If I had known she was here, I should have with- 
drawn my offer.’ — But in this matter poor Mr. Carr 
was not really guilty, for he had not known of Miss 
Crookenden’s presence himself. Save on gala days his 
acquaintance with the school extended no further than 
the board-room — the Professor discouraging all visits to 
the studios during working hours. While Mary had 
rather carefully abstained from giving her friends any clue 
to the manner in which she elected to spend her time just 
at present. She had enjoined silence on Madame Jacobini, 
moreover. — ‘ Don’t talk about my going there, Sara,’ she 
had said. 1 Then if I do get tired of it and give it up, 
nobody will bore me by asking why, and obliging me to 
confess to being, what Lance is pleased to call 
" changeable,” and so make me look foolish. I detest 
being made to look foolish.’ But of this Colthurst was 
ignorant. He, therefore, fell fiercely upon poor Adolphus 
in spirit, and mentally tore that somewhat flimsy, though 
well-preserved person to tatters. 

A rending of Mr. Carr asunder, however, was but the 
briefest of episodes, occupying but one turn across the 
office and back again. It left Colthurst where it had 
found him— standing morally opposite to a strangely 
ironical dilemma, and physically opposite to the half-open 
door leading on to the stone balcony. Restlessly, in 
obedience to a longing for anything that had in it a 
semblance of escape, he pushed the door wide open and 
stepped out on to the narrow space. Then stood silent 
looking down at the scene In his experience it was a 


214 


The Wages of Sin. 


familiar one enough. He had witnessed it, or something 
analogous to it, hundreds of times already. But familiarity 
had little influence over Colthurst’s imagination. Custom 
failed to blunt the edge of his perceptions, by rendering 
that which was familiar also of necessity stale. And 
to-day the scene held a peculiar meaning and value for 
him. Dilemma or none, it still was big with hope. 

The red- walled theatre looked vast and mysterious 
under its fog -darkened skylights. There was a telling 
violence of contrast between the clinging gloom above, 
and the vivid yellow-tinged glare of the big hooded 
lamp — the long metal pipe of it writhing down like some 
huge, black serpent, out of the obscurity of the far-off 
ceiling — all the strong, uncompromising light of it concen- 
trated on the low platform, where stood the model. A 
supple, broad featured, ox-faced young Italian, curly- 
headed, stripped, save for the blue and scarlet scarf twisted 
about his loins. Beautiful, but with the sullen, gross, 
unintelligent beauty that has got a very little way, as 
yet, from the beast. His feet were planted well apart. 
His right arm, and the upper part of his body were thrown 
forward, as making a lunge in fencing, causing the 
muscles of back and shoulder to stand out firm and taut 
under the lustrous skin, from the effort of enforced still- 
ness. Round three sides of the platform a space of 
boarded floor. Then a semicircular, wooden topped 
railing. And beyond, following the outer curve of it, a 
forest of close packed chairs and easels ; and a company 
of young men and women, sitting or standing amid an 
intricate network of sharp-edged light and shadow, cast by 
the great horse-shoe of gas-burners just over their heads. 

Yes, to Colthurst, standing on the narrow balcony gazing 
down at it, the scene was big with hope. The nobler 
and baser instincts in him, the intellectual and emotional 
sides of his nature, wrestled together fiercely just now. 
For he asked himself, honestly and straight, — hope of 
what ? Should this great, red-walled, fog-dimmed room, 
with its cunningly directed lights — with the still, strained, 
naked form of the model, too, in which he saw symbolic 
suggestion of the sacrificial victim, without whom the 
rites would be maimed and incomplete — should this be to 


The Drag on the Wheel. 


215 


him the temple in which he, as flamen, would teach men to 
worship worthily his immortal mistress Art ? Or should 
it be to him only a house of love, dedicated to the adora- 
tion of a very fair, but yet a mortal mistress — a mistress 
from whom, in his saner hours, he knew himself to be 
divided, not only by wide difference of surroundings and 
circumstance, but by a moral gulf, which he could cross 
only over the body of the mother of his child, the body of 
the woman who should have been his wife ? — The 
struggle was violent, as Colthurst stood there, gazing 
down. He was conscious of it, acutely, distressingly 
conscious of it. But as the seconds passed, the nobler 
instinct gained. Art claimed him first; and to conduct 
her worship worthily, he must keep himself free, as far as 
possible, from sentimental perturbation. And then, his 
attitude towards Mary Crookenden herself, began to alter. 
Inaccessible, surrounded by friends, protectors, admirers, 
she had been fair game. He might dare as he liked, try 
experiments, do his best to dominate her, and secure her 
recognition. The advantage remained hers. She was 
well able to protect herself. But now the parts were 
reversed. The advantage was his. All the latent chivalry, 
all the sweeter, gentler elements in Colthurst’s strangely 
complex temperament arose, and called aloud to him to 
control himself, to restrain himself, not by word or look to 
compromise her. 

‘ And yet it is hard, very hard/ he said to himself — 

1 just now with this undreamed-of chance given me. — Oh ! 
Jenny Parris, Jenny Parris, what a different world it 
would be for me to-day, if you and I had not let the flesh 
and the devil get the upper hand of us ten years ago. 
You’ve a lot to answer for.' 

And then somehow the remembrance of little Dot came 
across him, little Dot dancing to the droning sound of the 
barrel organ on the dreary pavement, among the litter, and 
dust, and whirling straws. 

' And so have 1/ he added with a movement of genuine 
remorse, ‘ God forgive me — so have I.’ 

'Ah, I see you are taking a glance at the school, Mr. 
Colthurst. The numbers are creditable, really very credit- 
able, considering the bad weather, don’t you think so? ' 


21 6 


The Wages of Sin . 


The under-master leaned his long back against the 
door-way, and gently rubbed his hands together under the 
tails of his coat. He loved the Connop Trust School as a 
father loves his child. He wanted the child to be praised. 
Further, he had a general and most delightfully agitating 
expectation of fireworks. He wanted Colthurst to go off, 
so to speak. His little remark represented the application 
of a mildly tentative match. Poor man, if he had but 
known, not innocuous toy fires, but fires wholly volcanic 
and destructive were in full play very close to him, just 
then. 

Colthurst, not without an effort, dragged himself up 
from the floor of his private pandemonium and answered 
absently. 

1 Yes, it’s an excellent school/ 

Both as praise and as fireworks this was disappointing. 
It did not amount to very much. Mr. Barwell struck 
another match. 

‘ A new model is always a little incentive to diligence/ 
he said. 1 And a time-sketch gives a pleasant flavour of 
competition to the work. Then to-day we have the extra 
incentive of a new directorship you see, Mr. Colthurst/ — -A 
perceptible suggestion of tail-wagging came on . — 1 Every 
one here is anxious to produce a favourable impression 
upon you. We are in no doubt at all as to the ability of 
our new master, and we are very anxious to oblige him to 
think highly of our abilities in return/ 

But the powder must have got damp somehow. For 
again Mr. Barwell was disappointed. Colthurst showed 
no signs of going off. Indeed, tentative matches and the 
mollifying ointment of flattery alike were wasted upon him 
at this moment. His own entry upon the balcony, there 
high up in the gloom, had been so noiseless that it had 
passed unobserved. But now, at the sound of voices, a 
slight movement was perceptible among the students in 
the theatre below. First one face and then another, flash- 
ing into momentary distinctness, had been upturned 
towards the speakers. The better, nobler side of Colt- 
hurst’s character was still in the ascendant. It had 
triumphed so far. Yet he could not help scrutinizing each 
face in turn with a certain avidity. Then at the far end of 


The Drag on the Wfyeel. 


21 7 


the semicircle of easels, he suddenly caught sight of a 
woman's blonde head. He stepped back into the office. 

* We'll go and 1-look at the work upstairs in the antique, 
if you p-please, Mr. Barwell,’ he said, stammering badly 
all at once. 

Thus, not with greedy devourings, but with purpose 
rather of stern and praiseworthy self-repression, did King 
Stork enter on his reign in the frog-pond. 


Chapter V. 

Perhaps the inherent force of a nature is shown even 
more in its passive and negative, than in its active and 
positive self expressions. In its power of voluntarily 
limiting its own horizon ; of setting itself arbitrary bound- 
aries ; of saying, ' thus far will I go, see, admit, and no 
further.’ For it takes a lot of latent strength to sit, either 
mentally or physically, really still. Not to fidget To 
'stay put,’’ in short. — And it was precisely this, mentally 
and emotionally to sit still, to stay put, that James Colt- 
hurst proposed to himself at this juncture. To live alto- 
gether in the present. To limit his horizon, and focus his 
eyes so as never to see beyond it. To fix an arbitrary 
boundary, across which his steps should never wander, 
even in thought. The term at the Connop School com- 
prised about twelve weeks — Easter falling late that year. 
And the end of term constituted Colthurst's horizon, con- 
stituted the boundary he had fixed. After that? He 
permitted himself to ask no such question. After that 
probably, in some form or other, the Deluge. But like 
many persons of strong desires and large purposes, he 
was something of a fatalist. He did not, therefore, waste 
and hamper the present by anxious efforts to get ready 
salvation-arks of gopher or any other species of wood 
against that possibly diluvian future. If the Deluge was 
to come, come it most assuredly would. Meanwhile 
sufficient unto the day was the evil, and likewise the good 
thereof. 

An; phe days just now, in one direction at all events, 


2 1 8 


The Wages of Sin. 


had much good in them. Colthurst very soon got those 
sixty and odd young people, all of them, that is to say, 
worth the getting, very well in hand. Those who had any 
wit or gravity of purpose in them he dominated intellec- 
tually. Those lighter creatures, in whom gravity was 
lacking, he carried along with him by the mere momentum 
of his personalty, as a big boulder rolling down the hill- 
side carries the little loose stones. It is not too much to 
say that by the end of the first six weeks he possessed the 
school, had it at his feet. He inspired warm admiration 
and enthusiasm. He did not inspire friendship. The 
conquering natures, I think, rarely inspire that, though 
they frequently inspire passion. 

And so all went well. The very monotony of the daily 
round of work soothed him. Deference and attention 
mitigated his irritability. Mr. Barwell, too, was always at 
hand with offerings of mollifying ointment. Colthurst’s 
old dreams of influence and mastery were coming true. 
His sheaf stood upright, while the sheaves of those about 
him did obeisance. And yet, somehow, he was not very 
elate. 

For the effort to observe limitations was a severe one, 
it produced queer results. And Colthurst was of the 
number of those persons who have an almost maddening 
capacity for registering their own sensations. At times 
the continued effort worked him up to a pitch of emotional 
excitement which only violent physical exercise could 
calm. He walked half across London sometimes at night ; 
seeing strange sights, meanwhile, witnessing the sordid, 
grotesque and various pageant of the streets of the great 
city as it can only be witnessed when reputable humanity 
lies safe and warm in bed, and disreputable humanity per- 
forins its moral and spiritual dance of death, unrestrained 
save by the advent of the very occasional policeman. At 
other times the effort induced in him a certain languor, a 
kind of pensive ecstasy, not unlike the half stupor produced 
by a narcotic. Colthurst hailed this singular condition 
when it came on him, yielded himself up to it unreservedly. 
The ecstasy seemed to culminate, reaching a degree of 
almost painful intensity during the five or ten minutes he 
spent daily standing beside Mary Crookenden, or sitting 


The Drag on the Wheel. 


219 


at her easel, although he only spoke to her of technical 
and impersonal matters, and that, as he tried never to 
forget, in the presence of a company of shrewd-eyed on- 
lookers. 

Colthurst was really struggling very gallantly to keep 
faith with the nobler side of his nature. But he felt 
somewhat like a rope-dancer, always balancing himself, 
not daring to move freely or look below, lest he should 
turn giddy, lose his footing and fall headlong. His 
standard of conduct was set at an almost extravagantly 
high level. The distance to the ground was very great. 
To fall headlong would be proportionately dangerous. He 
perceived that, and the idea of such a fall became not 
only increasingly alarming, but increasingly disgusting to 
him. For the ambition of conducting this delicate busi- 
ness to the end with success ; of behaving with an ideal 
sort of chivalry ; of being able, when it was all done and 
over, to look back on this period of his life without hint of 
self-accusation or self-reproach ; of being able to say that 
in respect of this one woman, at least, his bearing had 
been Quixotic in the refinement of its honour — the ambi- 
tion to accomplish this, partly out of reverence for Miss 
Crookenden herself, partly as an act of expiation, had 
taken very strong hold of Colthurst’s imagination. He 
almost prayed, fatalist though he was, that his effort to 
preserve a perfectly neutral attitude towards this beautiful 
woman, might be taken as payment of former sins against 
womanhood, might be accepted in liquidation of old bad 
debts. 

He tried to treat her precisely as he treated his other 
lady pupils. From the first he had ostensibly taken her 
presence entirely for granted ; had offered her no greeting, 
had expressed no surprise, no pleasure. With her he was 
as dogmatic and exacting as with the rest. More so, 
perhaps ; for several times Mary had reason — as she 
thought — to resent his strictures and accuse his criticism 
of a degree of quite uncalled-for brutality ; but there was no 
time for protest, for remonstrance. In his quick, deft, cat- 
like way Colthurst came, pulled her poor work, as she 
thought rather cruelly, to pieces, and went again. Mary 
was very much in earnest, hot with the desire to learn, 


220 


The Wages of Sin. 


absorbed in her employment ; yet, at moments she could 
not avoid being slightly piqued at Colthurst's — appar- 
ently — supreme indifference to her existence. She shut 
herself up within a stately coldness of manner. And 
Colthurst thanked her silently yet very devoutly for so 
doing. It made his position somewhat less trying. For 
dogmatism and apparent, indifference notwithstanding 
he was all the while acutely conscious of her every 
movement, of her every gesture, of every inflection 
of her voice, every detail of her dress — sober now, shorn 
of all superfluous ornament. He was conscious, too, of 
each delicate change in the waxen whiteness of her com- 
plexion, of the shade of red-brown which tinged her eye- 
lids as towards evening she grew tired from work in the 
hot dry atmosphere of the studios. All this Colthurst 
knew by instinct, for he avoided looking at her as 
much as he could. Any responsive kindling or softening 
of those beautiful eyes might prove the straw too much, 
and make him lose his balance. Ah ! such rope-dancing 
as this, going on day after day, week after week, must 
needs be too heavy a strain on any man’s nerves, unless 
he is made of ice and iron, rather than ordinary flesh and 
blood. Short of a moral miracle, loss of balance and 
consequent fall would seem inevitable. 

Perhaps the moral miracle might have been worked, and 
Colthurst thereby enabled to hold out to the appointed end 
of his risky performance — it is pleasant, any way, to 
imagine it would .have been so — had not Jenny Parris, 
with her incurable habit of riding to lose rather than win 
in the race of life, managed to give the tight-rope a shake 
which of necessity precipitated a catastrophe. 

It happened thus. Jenny was ill. The winter weather 
increased that nasty dragging cough of hers. She slept 
badly, sickened at the sight Of food, fell into a state of 
depression that stirred much kindliness and much indigna- 
tion in the ample bosom of Mrs. Prust. About the middle 
of January the state of affairs appeared so very serious to 
that excellent woman, that she went the length of packing 
her gouty and most unwilling master-mariner into a square 
cab, and sending him off to Kensington to look up Colt- 
hurst. Captain Prust's moral courage was not proportion-* 


The Drag on the Wheel. 


221 


ate to his irascibility, and this mission of remonstrance 
and rebuke was not in the very least to his taste. To his 
unspeakable relief Colthurst was out. He, therefore, 
contented himself by leaving a long rambling message 
calculated to obscure rather than set forth the truth. 

{ But he’ll know all about it soon enough,’ he said to 
himself on the return journey, spitting reflectively from 
the window of the square cab in the intervals of a conso- 
latory pipe. * Lord love you, S’lome’s crowding on sail. 
If she catches him she'll let him have it hot.’ 

In response to the enigmatic message Colthurst called 
at Delamere Crescent ; and, regardless of top dressings of 
coals of fire prepared by Mrs. Prust, soon called again. It 
was very painful to him to do so. That the ugly side of 
his life should clutch and hold him just now seemed rather 
cruel. But there is a fertilising power in all moral effort. 
Colthurst, trying honestly to do nobly in one direction, 
began to do at least not ignobly in others. He was really 
very kind to Jenny at this period ; kind in the litfle, 
material, unromantic ways which, for some reason, are so 
curiously comforting to a woman's heart. He brought her 
dainties, and coaxed her to eat, sitting meanwhile — his 
broad shoulders and square head silhouetted against the 
dingy window overlooking a long perspective of barren 
back yards — on the corner of the chest-of-drawers that 
occupied all the space between her untidy bed and the 
opposite wall of the narrow room. I do not wish to 
sentimentalize over James Colthurst. He was, to put it 
colloquially, plenty big enough to take care of himself. 
Yet somehow it strikes me as not a little pathetic, illustra- 
tive of the relentless dragging apart of the very founda- 
tions that may be taking place in careers apparently 
covered with brilliant success, to watch him go thus from 
reigning tyrant-like over all those clever young people at 
the Connop School, from inhaling the incense of good Mr. 
Barwell’s reverent admiration, from the promulgation of 
his gospel of art, from his silent adoration of so delicate 
and exquisite a product of high civilization as Mary 
Crookenden, — to sit on the corner of a chest-of-drawers in 
a cheerless, littered, stuffy lodging-house bedchamber, and 
help, with champagne and oysters, and Brand’s essence, 


222 


The Wages of Sin. 


and grapes and what not, to keep life in the woman whose 
final and permanent exit from life would have been the 
solution of so many problems, the easing of so many 
distresses for him. If we set forth the man’s bad moments, 
at least let us set forth his good ones as well ; remember- 
ing the divinely comfortable saying that there is greater 
joy in heaven over one repentant sinner than over the 
ninety-and-nine just persons who have no cause for re- 
pentance. 

And Colthurst did more than spend his substance in 
Heidsieck and oysters ; though not being very flush of 
money just now, that was tax enough in itself. His work 
at the Connop School had compelled him to postpone the 
finishing of the portrait mentioned by Adolphus Carr, and 
of another which he had been painting. It is true the 
Council had not accepted his proposal of giving his 
services, but the salary they could offer him as locum 
tenens was but a small one. Colthurst began to find the 
disagreeable old question of ways and means staring him in 
the face again by the beginning of February. He took 
radical measures to meet it He underlet the grand studio 
in Kensington to Horatio Deland, the thought-reader, who 
happily fancied it as presenting an attractive environment 
for seances and other entertainments of a pseudo-scientific, 
pseudo-necromantic description, in which that undulating 
spinster, Miss Dampier, Lady Theodosia Pringle, and 
other children of whom one charitably trusts Wisdom may 
one day be justified — that day I admit appears a long way 
off yet — enthusiastically took part. He installed himself 
meanwhile in a couple of rooms in a house just opposite 
the College entrance in Wentworth Street ; and removed 
his two Academy pictures to a small unused studio at the 
top of the school buildings, in which he contrived to do a 
fair amount of painting at odd hours. By these means he 
reduced current expenses sufficiently to be able to send 
Jenny away to a sheltered place on the south coast for 
three weeks, where little Dot built sand castles, decorated 
with whelk-shells and semi-defunct star -fish and other 
marine curiosities of high value, and danced around them 
in the frail spring sunshine, as gaily defiant of the incom- 
ing tide as though no ugly bar-sinister defaced her little 


The Drag on the Wheel. 


223 


private escutcheon and rendered her a wholly inconvenient 
and uncalled-for addition to the millions of the human 
race. Jenny came back very much the better for sea- 
breezes. She ate. She slept. The sense of returning 
health was almost intoxicating to her. Her spirits went 
up with a rush. From pure lightness of heart she was 
tempted to give the tight-rope that fatal shake. 

It fell out thus. Colthurst had, more than once, com- 
plained to his colleague of the costume models who sat 
for the female students in the class-room upstairs three 
times a week. 

'What is the possible use/ he said, 'of having one 
sleek Italian girl after another, with no more meaning 
behind her great, brown heifer’s eyes than one of the 
ruminants she, in her peaceable moments, so much re- 
sembles ? If we could have the girls as they look at 
home, in Fetter Lane say, when the devil gets into them, 
and white teeth show, and a knife glitters out in the 
yellow gas-light, there might be some object in drawing 
them. As it is, they are only a degree less unprofitable, 
less likely to fill our students’ heads with false notions of 
beauty, than that pantheon of stucco pagan deities in the 
antique. Can’t you get us a few Englishwomen whose 
beauty lies in something more intelligible and intelligent ? 
Women who have lost their baby-face and have acquired 
the aspect of ordinary, reasonable human beings, with a 
past behind and salvation or damnation ahead of 
them ? ’ 

Poor Mr. Barwell groaned a little inwardly- at this 
cheapening of the accredited Italian type and back- 
handed slap at the antique. But Colthurst’s word was 
law. So the amiable man hastened to put himself in 
communication with Miss Annie Sutton, an English model 
of unassailable respectability and considerable popularity, 
requesting her to pass the word to other members of the 
professional sisterhood. 

' I am happy to say I believe we have found just the 
person we require,’ the under-master announced, mildly 
radiant, meeting Colthurst in the office a few days later. 
' Not too young, the baby-face you so object to con- 
spicuous by its absence — a fine figure for drapery. She 


224 


The Wages of Sin . 


tells me she had the honour of standing to you several 
times a few years ago.’ 

For various reasons Colthurst was not ardently desirous 
of renewing the acquaintance of a few years ago. Just 
now he was engaged in turning down his trousers, the 
morning was warm and showery and the pavements 
slushy ; he straightened himself up rather sharply. 

• W-what’s her name ? ’ he asked. 

I Harris/ Mr. Barwell replied, a trifle surprised at the 
other's abruptness. 1 She gave it as Jane Harris.’ 

Colthurst completed the operation of turning down his 
trousers. A most unpleasant suspicion occurred to him ; 
but he thrust it aside as preposterous and consequently 
abominably unjust. 

I I never heard of the woman in my life/ he declared 
with a certain violence of denial. 

* Very likely not/ Mr. Barwell hastened to say. 1 But 
even models have the weakness, common to human nature, 
of embroidering truth slightly in furtherance of their own 
interests. A good many models whom you have never 
heard of in your life, Mr. Colthurst, I fancy, are tempted 
to use your name as a passport at present — that is one of 
the taxes levied on celebrity. But the worst of having 
English models is that they will chatter. They bring the 
gossip of half the studios in London here, and dribble it 
out to our students during the rests, and very doubtfully 
improving gossip a great deal of it is, too.’ 

Colthurst moved towards the office door. His expression 
was anything but benign. 

1 This woman must be told plainly we shall be obliged 
to her to hold her tongue then/ he said, rather brutally. 

The under-master shuffled after him, his countenance 
irradiated by an indulgent smile. The observation of 
Colthurst’s different phases afforded him endless food for 
meditation. * Amazingly vigorous/ he said to himself, 
* never two days alike.’ Then he added aloud : — 

( Yes, she shall be told, Mr. Colthurst. But a prohibition 
may not act as an effectual gag, I fear. In dealing with 
the fair sex silence is not always altogether easy to 
enforce, you know.' 

For, in truth, Mr. Barwell hankered after his heifer-eyed 


The Drag on the Wheel . 


225 


Italians. Human beings with a past behind and salvation 
or damnation ahead of them appeared to him somewhat 
exhausting. He was getting up in years ; and when the 
magnetism of Colthurst’s genius was lifted off him, he had 
no particular longing to knock his amiable bird-like head 
against any of the innumerable insoluble problems ol 
human existence. 

Colthurst ran quickly down stairs into the theatre. .The 
young men were working there alone ; and this usually 
was the occasion for his affording them much gratuitous 
instruction in the philosophy of art. But this morning he 
was harassed by that same suspicion. He could not 
'divest his mind of it. The suspicion was preposterous he 
admitted. Yet Colthurst’s imagination continued to play 
with it, to return to it to develop it, to see all that it might 
possibly mean and bring along with it, while repeating 
that it was preposterous and wholly inadmissible. And 
he perceived, moreover, that his hands were tied in re- 
spect of it ; and that to cross-question Mr. Barwell was to 
court the exposure* of that he so earnestly desired to keep 
hid. Fifty times he told himself the suspicion was an 
insanity. Fifty times he asked himself what on earth he 
should do if it proved correct ? The name too, sickened 
him. Jane Harris — if it was an alias f what depths of 
pitiful absurdity, poverty of invention there had been in 
the selection of it. 

It is needless to state that these meditations did not 
tend to make Colthurst pleasant company. When he left 
the theatre more than one young gentleman permitted 
himself to remark that 'The Boss was in the beastliest of 
beastly tempers to-day ; * that he looked ' as black as 
pitch ; ’ and that his criticisms were positively malignant 
in their severity. The students upstairs, in the antique, 
fared little better. A dreadful legend exists, but I refuse 
to vouch for the truth of it, that one soft-hearted damsel 
striving zealously to 'shade in the contours of time- 
honoured Discobolus/ was actually heard by her near 
neighbours to emit sounds suggestive of stifled weeping 
when he quitted her easel. This I trust was an ex- 
aggeration ; yet undoubtedly Colthurst induced considerable 
sensations of alarm in more than one of his pupils. A 

Q 


226 


The Wages of Sin. 


certain blackness and malignancy really did seem to 
emanate from him which was extremely disconcerting to 
weak nerves. It was hardly surprising. Pushed, pestered, 
haunted by that preposterous suspicion, his whole being 
was in revolt. 

Mary Crookenden had arrived rather late. She had 
hardly got her tools into order when Colthurst entered 
the- school. He perceived this, as he usually did perceive, 
at first glance how this particular young lady was 
employed, and decided, though her place was nearly in 
the centre of the room, to leave his lesson to her till 
among the last. She was drawing Wrestlers; but the 
outline of the two figures, crushed together in their fixed*, 
unending struggle, was barely complete as yet. Mary 
used charcoal well, delicately and freely. Her lines had 
meaning and value. Her drawing possessed that in- 
definable something which makes all the difference. She 
saw that presented to her freshly, unconventionally, as 
for the first time. She had a native gift of style. 

Colthurst — having completed his tour of the school — 
now standing just behind her looking at her sketch of the 
two straining figures, was aware of this ; and, notwith- 
standing his ill humour and disquieting suspicions it gave 
him pleasure. There was grip and vivacity in the sketch. 
Miss Crookenden, sensible of his presence, slipped off her 
high wooden chair, and stood on one side. Her move- 
ments were deliberate, to the point of indolence. Her 
face was vacant of expression. Her eyelids, with that 
brownish tinge upon them, drooped a little over her eyes. 
She wore a very plain grey gown, and a large white linen 
apron with a bib to it. She rested the butt-end of her 
maulstick on the ground and waited, attentive, silent, cold. 

Colthurst leaned both hands on the back of her vacant 
chair, glanced from the drawing-board to the group of 
statuary and back again. 

1 This is a good sketch/ he said presently. * It is 
accurate, and it is more than that. To take an original and 
imaginative view of these very familiar p-plaster idols is by 
no means easy ; but in the present case you strike me as 
having come very near performing that remarkable feat.' 

He leaned back, holding the chair at arm’s length, 


The Drag on the Wheel. 


227 


tipping the front legs of it off the ground. Looked care- 
fully at the drawing again, running his eyes rapidly, 
steadily over the bowed backs and strained, bent limbs. 
Then he looked full at Miss Crookenden. Hunted as he 
was and badgered by that preposterous suspicion, he grew 
reckless of danger. Neither the fever fit nor the languidly 
ecstatic fit of love was on him, but only a sombre sense of 
rebellion. If his suspicion was correct, before the day 
was out he would be put to the torture. In the interval 
he would stint himself of no fair sight that might chance 
to come in view. 

* Yes, this is good/ he repeated. 1 1 am proud of you, 
I congratulate you heartily, Miss Crookenden, on your 
work.* 

The compliment was startling in its unexpectedness. 
Mary did not move; but she was very much gratified. 
She could not help showing her gratification. She raised 
her head a little, raised her eyelids. 

‘ Thanks/ she said. * 1 am very glad you think well 
of it.* 

And Colthurst found himself staring into the luminous 
depths of her eyes. 

After the long course of abstinence to which he had 
condemned the emotional side of his nature so rigorously, 
his sensation for the instant was little short of rapture. 
He forgot everything in the delight of Miss Crookenden’s 
beauty and that gracious expression of pleasure that had 
come into her charming face. 

But the rapture was of brief duration. For the sus- 
picion, which for the instant he had beaten off as a 
wounded creature beats off the vultures drawing near to 
tear before their time, hopped evilly back again, even as 
the vultures hop, settled, stretched out its ugly naked neck 
and vicious beak. Colthurst’s imagination had gone to work 
again, and it flashed upon him the suggestion of a com- 
bination outrageous, hateful, in its incongruity. At all 
events, that must not be realized, come what might. Not 
on his own account — Colthurst cared very little about 
saving his own skin, just then — but because it offered 
an insult to Miss Crookenden which his mind refused to 
contemplate. The thought of it trenched on madness. 

U 2 


228 


The Wages of Sin, 


At the first hop of the returning vulture he had turned 
once more to Miss Crookenden's drawing-board. And 
the young lady was glad of this. For though Colthurst’s 
indifference had piqued her sometimes, she assured herself 
it was infinitely preferable to any recurrence of the 
eccentric bearing to which he had treated her on the 
occasion of their first meeting. Mary tried to forget that 
first meeting. It had been most disagreeable. Since 
then, Colthurst had done a great deal for her. She was 
very grateful to him. She was interested in him. More 
interested, possibly, than she quite admitted. His ap- 
proval of her drawing had given her acute satisfaction. But 
she hoped to goodness he was not going to manifest any 
eccentricities again. 

All this takes long to put into words. It occupied a 
very short time in fact. Mary had barely remarked 
Colthurst' s odd way of regarding her, felt relieved when 
it ceased, before he spoke. 

4 W-what shall you be doing this afternoon ? * he asked. 

4 Mr. Barwell told me to begin painting from the costume 
model. You remember, no doubt, we have a fresh one 
to-day.' 

Colthurst leaned forward and neatly swept a few loose 
crumbs of charcoal off the surface of the gray paper. 

4 I d-do not see that you are likely to gain any 
p-particular benefit by painting the costume model/ he 
said, speaking very rapidly in that hissing, hesitating way 
of his. 4 Costume m-models are rather cheap after all. 
If you want to work from them you can do so at any time 
— have them in your own studio at home — you know.’ — 
Colthurst paused. — 4 1 — I should much prefer your giving 
more time to anatomy. You may not have opportunities 
of studying it later — when you leave here, I mean. The 
theatre will be vacant this afternoon ; take this sketch 
down there, and with the help of the skeleton, and the 
anatomical figure, and the plates in Fau, try to put the 
bones into this upper figure and make an ecorche of the 
lower one. Barwell shall bring you the Vesalius out of 
the library, if you like. It would be c-capital practice for 
you. It would test your knowledge. It would teach you 
a lot.' 


The Drag on the Wheel. 


229 


He flicked off another crumb of charcoal. His heart 
beat in his ears. It seemed an age waiting, till Miss 
Crookenden’s grave voice answered — ‘ Very well. If you 
wish it. But it is rather a severe task.' 

Colthurst looked up. 

* I d-do wish it,' he stammered. * I wish it very much.' 

Mary could not help smiling, and that sweetly. She 
felt a strange pity, all at once, for this strong, dogmatic, 
domineering man. The unprofessional side of things 
intruded itself, somehow, for the first time in their daily 
intercourse. She could not resist making him a playful 
little speech. 

i You are master. Clearly it is for you to command, and 
for me to obey.' 

Colthurst's eyes were fixed on the drawing-board. The 
vulture had hopped a little way off again ; but only a little 
way. It sat watching. 

1 Thanks,' he said, quite gently. 1 In this case I have 
no doubt it will be best for you to obey.' 


Chapter VI. 

As Colthurst came into the class-room adjoining his 
studio, the costume model — had any of the ladies present 
observed the fact, which, being engaged with their own 
appearance and performances in view of the entrance of 
the master, they happily did not— narrowed her eyes 
in uncontrollable inclination towards laughter. The 
movement was irresistible, instantaneous. She mastered 
it, and again was absolutely still, save for the steady rise 
and fall of her bosom in breathing. 

Jenny had thrown herself into one of the semi-tragic, 
Sibylline attitudes which suited her height and large 
frame so well. She wore a — so-called — Greek robe of 
faded indigo-coloured woollen ; the material of it thin and 
pliant enough to indicate the outline of her finely-moulded 
limbs. It was fastened on either shoulder, leaving the 
whole of the arms bare, and was girdled cross-wise on 
the chest and under the bosom with narrow bands of tar- 


230 


The Wages of Sin. 


nished gold embroidery. Her back was towards Colthurst 
as he entered. She sat side-ways on her chair, one arm 
lying along the top bar of it, the other hanging straight 
down at her side. Her left knee was dropped as in half 
kneeling, and the soft blue draperies caught aside dis- 
closed her bare foot. Jenny, as we know, was well aware 
of the beauty of her feet, and on the subject of displaying 
them she and Mr. Barwell had had a smart little skirmish 
when he had come some hour and a half earlier to pose 
her. She had already whipped off her over-skirt and claret- 
coloured ulster, and was sitting on one end of the platform 
calmly divesting herself of her boots and stockings. 

1 1 think we needn’t trouble you to do that, Miss 
Harris,’ he had observed, mildly. 

* Excuse me,’ Jenny had answered very promptly, ‘but 
I don't agree. Why, the robe’s nowhere with a pair of 
muddy boots under it. I am a pretty sea: o ted hand at 
this business, and I tell you I’d rather not stand at all 
than do the thing shabbily.' She threw back her head 
with a laugh. 1 And it’ll be a good lesson, in more ways 
than one, for your students to see a shapely foot for once. 
I’ll warrant most of their own are crooked and cramped 
enough, what with pointed toes and high heels, and all 
the rest of it.’ 

Poor Mr. Barwell gave in. In truth, this model struck 
him as a rather embarrassing lady. He sighed for his 
ruminant Italians again. And it had required all his 
moral courage and sense of duty to enable him to speak 
to her about the high desirability of maintaining silence 
during the rests. 

1 Oh ! those are the orders, are they ? ’ she said, not with- 
out darkening of anger in her handsome face. 1 1 under- 
stand. You can make yourself easy. I'm not going to 
talk.’ — Mentally she called the amiable undermaster, a 
' frightful old granny,’ and despised him from the bottom 
of her heart. 

But once in position Jenny became utterly motionless — 
her eyes wide open looking out as to an infinite distance 
from under the cloud of hair massed low on her forehead. 
Probably she inherited this power of entire immobility 
from generations of sea-going ancestors — from men who 


The Drag on the Whee\ 


231 


had sat, hour after hour, in dreamy silence on the deck of 
some white-sailed vessel, staring across the vast furrowed 
plains of blue-green water; or who, when ashore, had 
lounged on the wall guarding the rocky road up from 
Beera Quay, in the crannies of which tiny ferns cluster 
and penny-pies root their round red-stemmed succulent 
leaves and spires of greenish flower, gazing away and 
away, in idle quiescent contentment, out to sea. 

It speaks well for Colthurst’s courage that finding his 
preposterous suspicions realized, seeing Jenny posing 
there in the indigo-coloured robe he knew so well, he 
managed to repress all outward signs of excitement. He 
had divined rightly, then. At first it was not fear of a 
scene and of consequent exposure which made Colthurst 
sicken inwardly and curse himself and this unruly being 
bound to him by an unacknowledgable tie. Rather was 
it the revelation of the grossness of her levity in having 
conceived the idea of coming here ; and the hatefulness of 
her actual presence, desecrating this place, in which some 
of the highest impulses and purest emotions of his life 
had been granted him. This was the reward he was to 
have, then, for the sacrifices he had so lately been making 
for her. This was the return for all his efforts to pay off 
old bad debts. To Jenny, lying ill in that untidy bed- 
chamber in Mrs., Prust’s lodging-house, he could be kind, 
tender, if needs be. But for Jenny obtruding herself 
here, for Jenny playing this horrible comedy, for Jenny 
under the same roof as Mary Crookenden, Colthurst 
feared he had no mercy. 

And then, as he began to pass from easel to easel, 
Jenny’s face and form became to him as one of those 
terrible, ever-changing, yet ever stable forms and faces 
seen in delirium. It was everywhere. Here by the door, 
an outline of brow, and cheek, and chin, the fine curve of 
the nape of her neck and shoulder. Next, three or four 
samples of her profile ; the three-quarters face, then the 
full face, worn yet handsome— the sad, still, grey eyes 
seeming to ask of the future, and of him, too — that was 
the intolerable burden of it — the righting of some great 
wrong once done her. Then the three-quarters face again, 
with the turning of the horse-shoe of easels. The profile ; 


232 


The Wages of Sin. 


and so back once more to the somewhat too accentuated 
outline of brow, and cheek and chin ; and on this side the 
raised arm and drooping hand, lying along the top of the 
chair-back. — Everywhere, wherever he looked, Jenny, 
Jenny, Jenny. A world of Jennies. Jenny angelic and 
Jenny demonic. Jenny feebly inadequate, elegant, barber- 
block-like, innocuous, full of shrinking propriety. Jenny 
exaggerated, fierce, Cassandra-like, portentous, and fate- 
ful. Jenny frankly absurd and ridiculous ; caricatures of 
her emphasizing every unhappy trait, every doubtfully 
graceful line of her. Each student, of all the twenty 
there, absorbed in the thought of Jenny. All the twenty 
right hands, there, busy reproducing an image of Jenny. 
All the forty eyes, there, dwelling, lingering, in close and 
careful scrutiny upon Jenny. And in the midst of them, 
uplifted, enthroned, silent, motionless, sphinx-like, Jenny 
herself, the living, breathing woman, — listening, he felt, 
to his lightest footfall, hearing his every word, counting 
his heart-beats, knowing, though in her present posture 
she could not see him, that the dull red flush had come 
up over his sallow skin, that his breath was short, that .it 
was just all he could do to steady his arm sufficiently to 
handle a brush or hold a stick of charcoal. 

And yet, hideous as it was, Colthurst saw he must go 
through with it. That, in bare self-defence, he must con- 
tinue to stand unconcernedly beside each one of these 
twenty easels in turn ; and treat each one of the twenty 
young ladies seated at them — diligent, respectful, in some 
cases clever and well-bred women — to a series of 
criticisms, conceived in a calm and judicial spirit, upon 
their presentment of lips he had kissed, of eyes that had 
wept over him, of hands that had tended him with untiring 
ministry in sickness. If he gave way, if he flinched, if 
ever so slight a lapse occurred in the authoritative indif- 
ference of his official manner, if he forgot for ever so short 
a space that he was here as Director of the Con nop Trust 
School, instructing a class of lady students in drawing and 
painting — as was their custom three days a week — from a 
professional costume model, hired to stand for the sum of 
one shilling and sixpence per hour, he was aware he 
should no longer be able to count on Jenny. Her silence. 


The Drag on the Wheel. 


233 


her discretion might be swept away in some wild outrush 
of personal feeling. She might blast his name, his position, 
his prospects by an impermissible revelation of the relation 
which existed between them. 

Colthurst felt like a man shut in a cage with a half- 
tamed lion. A false step, a slip, an instant of nervous- 
ness, and the beast might be at his throat. The tension 
was tremendous. Once he thought all was lost. 

He had worked his way half round, was nearly opposite 
to Jenny, when one of the students, just beyond, seated 
in the left-hand corner of the room, after consulting her 
watch, hung on the apex of her easel, called — * Time.’ 

Jenny rose. Stretched herself — she was a trifle 
cramped — with a superb disregard of observation, throw- 
ing her body back from the waist, while she clenched her 
hands and held them first straight out, then above her 
head. She laughed a little as she did so, quite good- 
humouredly, looking across at Colthurst — just then 
declaiming to a plain, industrious young lady on the 
muddy opacity of her flesh tints — with a very devil of 
mischief lurking in her eyes. 

And in justice to Jenny, it must be asserted that she 
had a most limited conception of the suffering she was 
inflicting on her former lover. She was feeling better, 
stronger after that dreary spell of illness. She longed 
for a little change, a dash of excitement, amid the dull 
sameness of her life. Poor, silly soul, she loved posing, 
loved striking an attitude, commanding admiration, loved 
having a roomful of people staring at her by the hour to- 
gether. Loved to hear her ‘ points ' discussed, to hear 
comments on her fine figure. Loved to sport that same 
indigo-coloured robe, with its strips of tarnished em- 
broidery. Loved to occupy a position of importance — 
even at the price of eighteenpence an hour. As she had 
said herself, she was only nine-and-twenty after all. Her 
tastes were not refined, I admit, but that did not prevent 
her desiring to gratify them ardently. Jim had been good, 
very good, to her lately. Her hopes had risen. She could 
understand — he had made her do that pretty plainly — 
that he could not have her at his studio. But this public 
art-school was quite another matter — so it seemed, at 


234 


The Wages of Sin. 


least to poor, short-sighted Jenny. She wanted so badly 
to know what it was all like; wanted to see Jim, in whose 
company she had come so near starving, set up as a great 
man, filling a post not disdained by a member of the 
Royal Academy itself. Jenny — it is piteous to think of 
all it implies as one writes it — had offered herself as 
model at the Connop School in pure lightness of heart. 
She longed for a frolic. She thought it would be a rare 
bit of fun to play this practical joke on James Colthurst. 

As luck would have it, too, the day was peculiarly 
windless and mild. Such moist, close, spring weather 
suited Jenny well. Her cough then gave her little trouble; 
and the damp air made her skin smooth and fair. She 
and Dot and Mrs. Prust had made quite merry in the 
grim sitting-room in Delamere Crescent, fastening up the 
blue robe under her dress-skirt, and getting the claret- 
coloured ulster to sit with some little air of fashion and 
smartness over the miscellaneous garments worn beneath 
it. The pink almonds were in flower in one of the squares 
through which she passed. Always generous and im- 
provident, she had bestowed quite a large sum in coppers 
on beggars and crossing-sweepers, and had gone on her 
way delighted by their vociferous blessings. She had 
met women selling bunches of yellow Lent lilies. Lent 
lilies grow in profusion on the banks of the glebe fields 
just around Beera Church. She remembered racing down 
in breathless haste, many a time, from afternoon school to 
gather them, with a company of bright-eyed, carmine- 
cheeked, little maidens like herself. The soft moisture of 
the spring day reminded her of the dear West country, 
too. Poor Jenny — one’s heart bleeds for her ! — she was 
happy, gentle, tender-hearted, full of shy hopes and 
pretty memories as she set out on her disastrous fool’s 
errand to the Connop School at noon. . 

Tenderness had given place to another order of emotion 
now, yet Jenny was still gay. She was a good deal im- 
pressed, it is true, by the dignity which surrounded James 
Colthurst, by the deference with which she observed he 
was spoken of and treated. But she had not been unaware 
of the slight movement of self-consciousness, a trifle of 
that amiable desire which all right-minded young womek 


The Drag on the Wheel ’ 


235 


exhibit to appear to the best advantage on finding them- 
selves in the presence of a member of the opposite sex, 
among the assembled students when the master came into 
the room. And this, although it aroused her jealousy 
slightly, was highly diverting to her. She had not any 
wish or intention of compromising Colthurst, far from 
that. But she was amused, on the alert, observant ; and 
she laughed as she looked at Jim by way of gathering 
him into the joke — just to let him know it. 

Colthurst retained his composure. 

‘Your shadows are not nearly warm enough/ he was 
saying. ‘They are too grey. Your flesh tones will be 
decidedly harsh and false unless you modify them/ 

The young lady assented ruefully, humbly. 

‘Just hold up your canvas, please/ he went on doggedly. 
‘ Match the basis of colour as you have it against the 
model’s face and neck. Do you see, now ? I am sorry 
to tell you this is lamentably weak.' 

Colthurst drew himself up, and raised his voice, 
addressing the whole class : — 

‘I wish you to understand, once and for all, ladies, that 
weakness, either in conception or execution, is in my 
opinion the un — p-pardonable sin. It may be taken as an 
axiom in all d-departments of arts, that where there is 
strength there is hope. Weakness, feebleness, are hope- 
less. I remark an inclination among you, if you will 
p-pardon my speaking frankly, to be enamoured of the 
pretty-pretty, of that feebleness which it is the fashion 
to disguise under the p-plea of refinement/ 

Jenny’s laugh had exasperated Colthurst beyond endur- 
ance. She stood lazily resting her hands on the top-rail 
of her chair. A magnificent creature, notwithstanding 
past hard-living, and recent illness, in her flowing garments, 
with that sharp-edged mocking smile upon her full lips. 
Colthurst gave her a straight glance from under his heavy 
brows. The line across his forehead was cut deep, and 
his restless, fanatical eyes had a wicked expression in 
thefn. 

‘It is because I want to correct this inclination in you, 
ladies/ he went on, ‘that I have requested Mr. Barwell to 
ensrage no more Italian models for you at p-present. I am 


2 36 


The Wages 0/ Sin. 


anxious you should have more solid and less superficially 
pleasing material to study from. I b-beg you to throw 
aside all thoughts of the pretty-pretty, all longings after 
refinement. Those longings will not be gratified. I b-beg 
you to understand that this model is not selected because 
she offers you any approach to an ideal type of beauty. 
We p-propose dropping beauty for a time, and giving you 
the wholesome tonic of average fact. I b-beg you, there- 
fore, to draw and paint, in as far as you are able, precisely 
what you see. There are imperfections in your subject. 
State them. I desire no softening d-down, no finicking 
attempts to present a grace or charm which is absent in the 
original ; no squeamish ignoring of what may appear to 
you common or coarse. 1 

Colthurst paused. The sound of his own words 
heightened his excitement, his sense of the wrong done, 
the insult offered him. He had begun striking that danger- 
ous wild beast — to pick up our old illustration again — 
in self-defence. But his blood was up. Too soon he 
struck, not in self-defence, but for the mere brutal pleasure 
of striking. 

Jenny listened in growing horror of amazement. 
Gradually the enormity of her own folly dawned upon her. 
Colthurst’s voice and manner cowed her, and she slunk 
back to her seat again ; and bent her head low as she 
arranged her voluminous blue draperies. 

1 1 d-demand that your work be perfectly honest and 
straightforward/ he continued, 1 right down on the lines of 
life as you know it. Personally I should prefer your draw- 
ing from models wearing their ordinary everyd-day clothes 
— putting all question of costume, another name for silly, 
showy, theatrical dressing-up — aside. When the aesthetic 
sense of the British public is so highly developed that it 
has become customary for women to trail about the dirty 
streets there outside in Greek robes, it will be quite time 
enough, to my thinking, for you to study the folds of them. 
Is the rest up ? ’ he asked, turning abruptly upon the 
possessor of the watch in the right-hand corner of the 
room. 

She answered very hurriedly in the affirmative, having 
a sense that the air, for cause unknown, was most dis- 


The Drag on the Wheel . 


237 


agreeably overcharged with electricity; and ‘ wishing 
really/ as she subsequently remarked, in the ladies’ cloak 
room, ' that if Mr. Colthurst had things like that to say — 
of course he was quite right in theory — but if he wanted to 
say those sort of things he wouldn’t say them before the 
model, because really it made one feel so dreadfully hot 
and uncomfortable, you know.’ 

Jenny, meanwhile, raised her bowed head, tried to settle 
herself back into position. But her sight was all blurred. 
She could not make out the chalk marks for her feet. Her 
heart beat so fast, that it shook her whole frame. She 
could hardly keep her arms or body still. 

Colthurst watched her steadily for a minute, in silence. 
Then he threaded his way between the intervening easels, 
and went up close to the platform. 

1 You have shifted your position,’ he said, still speaking 
in the same unnaturally loud, hard voice. ‘ I must trouble 
you to bring your left arm more this way. Yes — so — 
that’s better. And the mark for your foot is at least two 
inches further back. There — that’ll do.’ 

As she stooped down to rearrange the edge of the 
drapery about her foot, Jenny gave Colthurst one look of 
desperate, despairing entreaty. He was so close to her 
she could have touched him. 

'Jim !’ she said, with a gasp under her breath. 

As her lips moved Colthurst started back, bringing 
his elbow into collision with the tray of the nearest 
easel — sending plummet, crayons, stumps, and charcoal 
rattling on to the ground. 

There was a depth of pettiness and miserable meanness 
in his action which was abhorrent to him. It was dis- 
gusting, but it saved the situation. With profuse apologies 
for his awkwardness he bent down and recovered the 
scattered drawing materials ; then moved quickly back to his 
former place, and went on with his lesson once more. Alas ! 
poor, short-sighted, foolish, impossible Jenny, is this the 
wretched end of your frolic ? or is there worse — you begin 
to fear it — behind ? 

The lion dared not spring now. He had very effectually 
beaten the creature into submissive humility. There 
would be no scandal, He would see Jenny to-night or 


238 


The Wages of Sin. 


some time to-morrow in Delamere Crescent. She should 
break her engagement. She should put in no second 
appearance, that was very certain. Colthurst had no 
fear but that he could secure himself against any 
repetition of this persecution. But still it seemed to 
him that she had done him an unpardonable injury. 
She had rendered his high efforts abortive. Coarsely, 
wantonly she had rubbed the bloom off his work 
and off his love. Here, in this place, where the ugly 
past had seemed to be falling from him, releasing him 
from so much that he loathed as low and disgraceful, 
here where he had made a really gallant effort to work 
out his salvation, here Jenny had come and claimed him; 
strongly, if silently, had laid her hands upon him; had 
shamed and outraged him — in his own eyes, in any case. 
Yes, let us try to hold the balance even. The suffering, 
the injury, were by no means all on the woman’s side. 

How Colthurst got through the remainder of the lesson 
he hardly knew. For still around him everywhere was the 
pictured horror of Jenny’s face and figure. The face that 
had made his fortune. The face he had painted in his now 
famous 1 Road to Ruin ’ — the picture which, as he knew, 
was travelling over the length and breadth of England, 
drawing a crowd of interested spectators to the library or 
fine arts gallery of a hundred watering places and provincial 
towns. — And there in the midst still, her laughter dead, her 
spirit broken, beaten into submission by the lash of his 
cruel tongue, motionless, speechless, as a being under the 
blighting curse of some weird spell, Jenny herself — Jenny, 
poor soul, who, thanks to him, had wandered so many 
weary steps along that same road to ruin now. 

At last it was over. The door was shut between them ; 
and Colthurst stood on the flagged landing outside, alone. 


The Drag on the Wheel. 


239 


Chapter VII. 

The relief of being outside there alone was great. Now 
that the strain was over Colthurst felt utterly worn out. 
The lower sash of the high, narrow landing-window had 
been thrown up. He leaned his elbows on the window- 
sill. The moist spring air was welcome to him. 

The sun had come out, and glistened on the wet slated 
roofs of the college buildings opposite. Below, in the 
centre of the quadrangle, some sparrows played about the 
shallow stone basin, which, with its attenuated squirt of 
water, relieved the uninteresting uniformity of the sur- 
rounding asphalt pavement. Colthurst noted these things, 
noted them with the vacant sort of observation which goes 
no further than eye and ear, awakening no responsive 
movement of the intelligence. Noted the heavy masses of 
steaming purplish vapour, sun-gilded here and there, trail- 
ing away above the city to eastward. Noted the hoarse 
roar of the traffic, setting to and from the great railway 
terminus whose rounded, glazed roofs to the left gave off 
a wide dazzle of misty brightness. Noted, too, that the 
sharp impudent chirping of the sparrows detached itself 
from that continuous roar like points of light from a sombre 
background. 

Colthurst was very miserable as he leaned on the 
window-sill and gazed down into the sloppy quadrangle. 
The deluge had come. And it appeared to be an universal 
one. Usually he was self-sufficing enough, but now his 
self-confidence deserted him. He was swept under by a 
tide of all-embracing scepticism. Turn where he would 
there seemed no hope, no comfort left. For, as is the case 
with so many of us when the world goes ill with us, 
Colthurst was guilty of the egotism of shifting the blame 
from his own shoulders on to those of the general 
constitution of things ; of making the universal economy, 
in short, responsible for the consequences of his own none 
too virtuous actions. It was excusable perhaps, for he was 


240 


The Wages of Sin. 


very tired. Much of his depression was physical, no 
doubt, the result of acute nervous exhaustion. Yet, as is 
the way of persons troubled by excitable brains, while his 
body actually ached from weariness, his mind worked with 
feverish exaggerated activity, presenting to him a pro- 
cession of disjointed images in which a very sufficient 
spirit of pessimism found vent. 

1 If one could only stop the machinery for an hour or 
two/ he said to himself, 1 and get a rest ! Expunge 
thought and feeling, put out one’s eyes, shut one’s ears, sit 
dumb, blind, solitary in the void. If there is a void — but 
that’s just the intolerable wear and tear of it, there is no 
void, no space of silence and quiet. Everywhere energy, 
force, drive. Everywhere a crowd, a hideous jostling 
crowd of things struggling to be born ; struggling to make 
themselves heard and felt; struggling to push something 
else aside so as to make their word, their want, their 
meaning known. And all to no purpose. Their word is 
emptiness, their want fruitless, their meaning nil . For the 
circle is never broken ; nothing, nobody, can even break 
out of it and be free. The great mill-stones turn and turn 
on themselves eternally, grinding down each generation — 
man, beast, all living beings alike — into food for the coming 
generations, which in due time will be ground down too. If 
one could only remember that, be passive, be careless, refuse 
to expect, refuse to fight. But then comes in the infernal 
malice of the whole conception. Good care has been taken 
to make us so that we must expect, must fight. For the 
sake of keeping the gigantic farce in full play we are 
tricked with an innate conviction of our own power, 
freedom, personality, tricked by the flattering conceit that 
it is not only possible but incumbent upon us to act, and 
create, and believe, and find out.’ 

Colthurst rested his head in both hands. 

‘That the race may continue, and so the great mills 
never lack grist, that the great lie may thrive, burgeon out, 
grow fatter and fuller, as the ages go forward, it is to 
further this end and this only, that our mothers conceive 
us, bring us forth with strong crying and tears, suckle us 
with an infinitude of brooding tenderness ; that we our- 
selves push up, love, suffer, aspire, live our lives withou 


The Drag on the Wheel. 


241 


stint. Maimed and degraded, triumphant and sainted, 
genius, idiot, or good, ordinary, thick-witted philistine 
alike/ he said, 1 there’s no escape for any one of us. We’re 
all shot into the hopper and ground down at last.’ 

He let his hands sink on the stone window-ledge, while 
with a vacant attention he watched the movements of the 
impudently chirping sparrows playing about the stone 
basin. And as he did so the thought occurred to him, in 
an idly speculative way, of how simple it would be to lean 
out of the window a little too far. The drop was close 
upon fifty feet, he judged, to the ground. 

‘ It seems curiously easy to forestall fate,' he said, * and 
shoot oneself into the hopper. I wonder people don’t do 
it oftener. One can't help fancying one might find 
quiet so.’ 

To his imagination the idea of falling from some great 
height had always been strangely fascinating. He 
remembered how, when he had that brain fever as a boy, 
night after night he had felt himself compelled by some 
resistless power — he could give it neither shape nor name 
— to crawl out to the extreme edge of Saturn’s luminous 
ring, and look over into illimitable space. And how, at 
least one night, one frightful — or was it blissful ? — night, 
the power had pressed him harder than ever before. Had 
forced him out and out, had come close and grappled with 
him, had seized and flung him over headlong into the 
bottomless gulf of space, of darkness, and of utter silence, 
save for the hiss of his own body rushing downward 
through the blank air. 

He had not thought of the dream for years. Not since 
— not since the night of Jenny Parris’ birthday party at 
Red Rock Mouth, when he had watched the drifting 
herring-boats from the rocky road leading up from Beera 
Quay. He recalled the whole scene as though it had been 
of yesterday. The black headland, the glistening pallor 
hanging in the west, the babble of the stream down the 
gulley mingling with the growling trample of the ground 
swell on the beach below ; his groping for stones in the 
roadway, wherewith to prove the world was round ; and 
the light in Jenny’s bedroom window. 

Jenny Parris. — Colthurst was filled to overflowing with 

R 


242 


The Wages of Sin . 


bitterness, For he might rail at the universal economy and 
general constitution of things as loudly as he pleased ; try 
at once to conceal the indignity of his present position, and 
assuage his disgust of it by fine phrases of pessimist 
philosophy; but it all came back to Jenny, and that which 
she stood for — the breach of a plain moral law — in the end. 
It was no relentless, fantastic circle of fate, no grinding of 
nether or any other mill- stones from which escape was 
impossible; it was just simply Jenny, and that which of 
necessity she brought him, and that which he — Colthurst 
admitted it — equally brought her, payment of the wages of 
a common sin. 

Perhaps, admitting this, he should have cried 1 quits/ 
and let the matter rest ; but that was asking too much of 
his forbearance and sense of justice as yet. The last 
payment she had made him was too recent, too insolent, 
too degrading, so it seemed to him. Just now he hated 
her. Hated her with the intensity with which we can 
alone hate that which compels us, in self-defence, to fall 
back on our lower nature. It was through the baser part 
of him she had tempted him years ago. It was in the 
baser part of him he had sought and found protection just 
now. Remembering his own cruel words hurled at the 
cowed, in a way, defenceless woman ; remembering the 
odious little incident of the scattered stumps and crayons, 
Colthurst called himself a cad and a cur. But she had 
driven him to it ; and what guarantee had he that she 
might not drive him to as bad or worse again? Here 
was a despair, low, immediate, practical, and therefore 
far more really searching and poignant, than any of the 
pompous, high-sounding ones he had so lately propounded. 

And then leaning out of the window, looking down at 
the grey pavement, that drop of fifty feet presented itself 
in another aspect. So far he had treated it merely specu- 
latively, for, at bottom, Colthurst despised suicide. It 
had always struck him as a lamentable confession of 
weakness and inadequacy; as a very crude fashion, at 
once stupid and showy, of cutting the knot. But now — 
for he reasoned it all out with that untempered lucidity, 
that unsparing logic, which is proof not of clearness of 
mind, but of a mind unhinged by nervous exhaustion, the 


The Drag on the Wheel. 


243 


terrible logic and lucidity of a sleepless night, when the 
vitality ebbs and imagination runs madly riot in the small 
hours before the dawn — now thinking of Jenny, and the 
baseness to which she had pushed him and might push him 
again — (had not that old dream truth in it ? Was it not 
the forecast of all this? Was not Jenny Parris and that 
which she symbolized the invisible power forcing him out 
and out to the edge of the luminous ring, one day to fling 
him over into the infinite of blank space ?) — now suicide 
appeared not so much an act of defective moral courage, 
as of the finely-tempered courage which prefers martyrdom 
to apostasy. This seemed to him the final and permanent 
escape from Jenny, the final and complete payment of 
these same ugly wages of sin. But for her he would have 
died three years ago in the fly-blown garret of that hotel 
garni in Paris. She had kept life in him at the sacrifice 
of what remained to her of good fame ; thereby, making 
his life hers, in a sense, not his own. She had given his life 
back to him, but given it back polluted. And — the deluge 
was not after all an universal one, for sweet influences 
from out of his recent efforts at chivalry and noble conduct 
clung to Colthurst still — that pollution was to him unbear- 
able, better washed off by the waters of the river of deatji 
even than not washed off at all. The selfish desire for 
mere rest was gone. It had given place to a distinct 
temptation ; but the temptation can hardly be called an 
ignoble one as it presented itself to Colthurst in that 
moment of exaggerated feeling. He was tempted to lose 
his life, lose the life of the animal on the bare chance, the 
very remote chance — for it was no more after all to him — 
of saving that of the spiritual man. 

1 Yet, it seems hard/ he said, 1 a trifle hard to be 
called upon to throw everything overboard at three-and- 
thirty.’ 

He drew his right knee up on to the window-ledge, and 
leaned out still farther, grasping the outer edge of the stone 
sill with both hands. It was characteristic of Colthurst’s 
nature that even at this somewhat tremendous juncture 
the cool, calculating element in him asserted itself. He 
abhorred a bungle. He required to do things neatly. He 
wished now to assure himself that the height was suffi- 
. R 2 


244 


The Wages of Sin. 


cient, that no projection of doorway or window cornice 
would interfere to break the fall. He even wished the 
asphalt was It si sloppy. It looked messy, unpleasant. 
He wondered, oddly enough, about the sparrows. When 
it happened, would they be frightened into seeking refuge 
upon the shiny slated roofs opposite ? or would they only 
flit away a yard or two, and then flit back to peep and 
chatter, and inspect that which lay inert on the pavement 
with bright, inquisitive, half-derisive little eyes ? 

Colthurst drew up the other knee, stood upright on the 
narrow sill, pressing the palms of his hands against the jamb 
of the window on either side. The bottom of the frame of 
the open sash was just on a level with fris forehead. That 
was tiresome, cramping. He would have preferred a clear 
space, absence of all obstruction. And then, by a grotesque 
turn of fancy, the image of a conjuror’s dog he had once 
seen jumping through red-covered hoops at a fair came to 
his mind — lowering its head, flattening itself out, laying its 
fore-paws together as it leapt. 

For a moment he looked at the masses of sun-gilded 
vapour trailing eastward ; listened to the hoarse roar of 
the streets. A passion of regret for all that the earth has 
to show, which he would never see, for all life has to make 
known which he would never learn, came over him ; for 
the ruin of his high hopes of artistic reformation ; for the 
pictures haunting his brain, which he would never paint ; 
for his fruitless love, the love he would never tell to the 
woman who had inspired it — a love still-born, destroyed 
before it had tasted the joy of existence. And then he 
thought of Dot — his own flesh and blood, as Jenny had 
said to him — poor, shrewd, naughty, bastard, little Dot. 
What would become of her? Would she go the same 
ugly way her mother had gone ? 

Clearly it would be wiser to make short work, to put a 
final and effectual stop to all this thinking. 

Colthurst brought his heels together upon the ledge, lifted 
his hands from the jambs of the window, placed them palm 
to palm, took a long breath, looked down ; the height was 
giddy standing here. 

Just then the sparrows started upward in hurried, jerky 
flight. 


The Drag on the Wheel . 


245 


'Ah, they're flown !’ he cried, involuntarily, out loud. 

The sky above, the pavement below, the surrounding 
buildings, seemed to rock, to reel together in horrible, 
formless confusion. He had a sense of loss of balance, of 
slipping, of clutching at something, of a jar right through 
him, of a shatter of breaking glass, of moving figures, 
V9ices, laughter. 

He believed that it was all over, that he had fallen ; 
suffered a ghastly fear, too, since he still heard, saw, 
thought, that though the body dies consciousness may re- 
main. Then gradually he became aware that he was 
standing upon the landing once more ; that he had tipped 
back in losing his balance, not forward ; that he had clutched 
the bottom of the window-sash and pulled it down along 
with him, forcing his hands through a couple of panes of 
glass ; aware that the doors of the medical school, at the 
far end of the quadrangle, were open, and that the students 
were trooping out ; aware that Mary Crookenden’s stately 
mulatto nurse, a flaring scarlet and gold handkerchief 
above her patient dusky face, was slowly ascending the 
steps leading to. the art school entrance; aware that 
shuffling footsteps — Mr. Barwell’s probably, the good man 
was going to take a look at the costume model still posing 
in the class-room there, and at the twenty young ladies still 
busily drawing her — were coming upstairs. 

Colthurst was dazed and faint. Mechanically he dusted 
the grit from the window-ledge off the knees of his trousers ; 
saw one hand was cut and bruised, wiped away the blood. 
As to his escape, he hardly took that in as yet. The 
feeling uppermost in his mind was one of dull self-mockery. 
It was pitifully ignominious to have gone so far and no 
further, to have taken so much trouble for nothing. He 
jeered at himself in sombre self-contempt; yet he was 
sensible of a need — the sight of the old coloured woman 
had stirred it in him — a need, whatever happened, to see 
Mary Crook enden once again. 


246 


The Wages of Sin. 


Chapter VIII. 

The injured-looking widow who presides over the ladies 
cloak-room had just retired, after informing Miss Crooken- 
den that her servant was waiting for her. She belonged 
to that congenitally feeble order of persons who are per- 
petually guilty of small awkwardnesses ; consequently the 
handle slipped through her fingers as she went, causing the 
door to slam loudly behind her. The sound echoed round 
the great room, and up to the domed roof. And as the 
clamour died away, Mary, standing before the easel sorting 
the anatomical plates she had been consulting and return- 
ing them to their red-covered portfolio, suddenly became 
aware of James Colthurst’s presence, and of his rapid, 
whispering, hesitating accents as he addressed her. 

‘ Are you g-going ? M-must you go, Miss Crookenden ? 
It is quite early yet.’ 

Mary set a high value on Mr. Colthurst’s instruction ; 
but just now she was tired. The atmosphere of the studios 
on this enervating spring day did not tend to the genera- 
tion of an ardent thirst for labour. She was sorry to 
waste the chance of receiving an extra lesson, but she 
really wished to depart. Moreover, she had promised to 
drop in to tea with Miss Aldham on her way home. Lady 
Alicia Winterbotham and Violet were to be there. And at 
this period Mary took a lively interest in Miss Winter- 
botham. She tried hard to like that very pretty and alert 
little lady very much indeed. 

1 Of course, it will end in her marrying Lance/ she told 
herself, ' and I must be great friends with the dear boy’s 
wife.’ 

Yet Mary had to admit the friendship did not spring 
up as rapidly and strongly as she could have desired. 
It was a plant, apparently, demanding a vast amount 
of cultivation. She really was very conscientious. She 
raked, and hoed, and watered and trained, and shone 
as sunnily in little compliments and attentions as she 
knew how upon the plant, with the result that Miss 
Winterbotham repeatedly declared her to be 1 quiet 


The Drag on the Wheel . 


247 


too dear and delightful for words.’ Still something was 
lacking which should lie at the heart of friendship. 
Mary knew that. She hoped the fault was in herself. 
She wished — for subtle reasons, not wholly undiscover- 
able, I trust, to an acute reader — to entertain the highest 
possible opinion of Miss Winterbotham. She was most 
unwilling to recognise the minutest rift within the lute of 
the young girl’s charms. And it was with the hope of 
convincing herself that Miss Winterbotham was really and 
after all riftless, completely sound, she was hurrying to 
Miss Aldham’s small tea-party now. Her mind at this 
moment ran far more upon her cousin’s possible bride than 
upon Mr. Colthurst and her own anatomical studies, and so 
her smile, as she turned to answer Colthurst, was slightly 
perfunctory, impersonal, a mere veiling of the wish to be 
left to her own devices. 

1 It is very good of you to come in to see my drawing,’ 
she said, 1 but, really, I’m afraid it is hardly worth showing 
you. I have been disgracefully lazy this afternoon. Iam 
afraid I have done next to nothing. I should much prefer 
your seeing it a day or two hence, when there is more to 
criticize.’ 

It is not easy to step gracefully from the banks of the 
river of death to the neatly-paved highway of ordinary 
light social intercourse. Colthurst’s retina still retained a 
pretty vigorous impression of the rush and swirl of those 
dark waters. He could not succeed in making the transit 
with easy indifference. He demanded sympathy, comfort. 
None were to be got thus. To get them — so it seemed to 
him, at least — he must compel this fair woman to leave the 
said neatly-paved highway upon which she evidently pro- 
posed to meet, and to pass him with no more than a civil 
bow, compel her to stand by his side on the banks of that 
awful, all-engulfing stream. 

4 1 d-did not come to see your d-drawing, Miss Crooken- 
den,’ he said. * I came t-to see you.’ 

Thanks to his excessive stammering, Mary did not 
gather the full significance of this announcement, but her 
attention was arrested by his manner. Her smile faded, 
giving place to a certain wondering and startled distress. To 
mental suffering — specially when inflicted by herself— our 


248 


The Wages of Sin. 


young lady has on one or two occasions, I fear, shown 
herself somewhat callous. Physical suffering, however, 
affected her very differently. Its appeal was immediate, 
her response equally immediate. Miss Crookenden, 
beneath her little airs and graces, her touch of coldness, of 
languor, her very real and not unadmirable pride, had 
retained much of the capacity of passionate pity which 
had made her, ten years ago, fling herself face downward 
among the heather in Slerracombe Deer Park and cry her 
heart out over the death-squeak of a rabbit. And Colthurst 
just now bore undeniable marks of suffering upon him. 
His face was almost livid. It had a kind of ravaged look 
on it; it was seamed with hard lines. His narrow, un- 
shadowed eyes were at once dull and wild. His habitual 
restlessness was accentuated. He could not keep still ; 
he moved to and fro with the disquiet of exhaustion, like 
one tossing in fever. His usually upright and active, 
though heavy, figure was all slouched together. Miss 
Crookenden was only accustomed to behold her fellow- 
creatures in the well-groomed, full-fed, excellently finished 
condition common to civilised society. Colthurst’s dis- 
ordered appearance struck her, therefore, all the more 
forcibly. She had never seen any one look like this before. 

* What has happened ? ’ she asked. * You are ill — you 
are in pain/ 

Colthurst tried to answer that nothing had happened, 
nothing was the matter, but his stammer got altogether the 
better of him. At no time was it a noisy stammer ; it 
was not noisy now, but it was persistent, absolute. Fight 
against it as he might, wrench at his shiit collar, put forth 
all the energy left in him to overcome it, he could not 
articulate an intelligible word. 

Then, indeed, it did seem to him he had reached the 
nadir ; that he was drinking the very dregs of the day’s 
cup of humiliation. For this revolt on the part of his 
body, this refusal of obedience, this breaking of the natural 
connection between the material and mental parts of him- 
self in his present overwrought, highly nervous condition, 
was frightful. The city was divided against itself; his 
foes, in the most literal and practical sense of the phrase, 
were of his own household. 


The Drag on the Wheel. 


249 


He flung himself down on the wooden bench running 
round outside the rail that pens off the space allotted to 
the model’s platform. Spread out his hands with a 
gesture of despairing self-disgust, and looked up dumbly 
at Mary Crookenden ? 

And shall we think the less well of Miss Crookenden 
because in response to that look and gesture the snow 
melted somewhat ? Because she ceased to consider the 
minor proprieties very carefully ? Because she listened 
to the voice of her womanhood, rather than to the voice 
of conventional discretion? Because, in short, she be- 
haved as a pure-minded person and not as a prude ? 

1 Ah,’ she said, gently, quickly, 1 pray don’t be so dis- 
tressed. Wait a little ; rest. Don’t try to speak yet/ 

She was strangely moved, willing to make concessions. 

* Never mind my engagement. I can wait if you wish me 
to wait. And you do wish it, I think,’ she said. 

For all answer Colthurst held out his hand, still looking 
up. He was not dangerous, dominating, possessive, 
intrusive, just then. Genii, bear and cat alike were 
banished. The daemonic element was in abeyance. Only 
the human creature was left— the human creature hunted, 
exhausted, utterly weary from the tearing of devils it had, 
after all, striven not ungallantly to cast out — asking for a 
trifle of kindness, of sympathy, for the simple yet pro- 
found consolation which a friendly human touch alone can 
give. 

For a just perceptible space Mary Crookenden hesitated. 
Then calmly, with a lift of her head, and a fine seriousness 
tempering the yielding gentleness of the action, she placed 
her hand in his. The sister of charity thinks it no shame 
to let the sick, pain-racked head rest if needs be upon her 
bosom. Mary, recognising the supreme claim of suffering, 
thought no shame either, as Colthurst’s quick, deft fingers 
closed quietly, steadily, without emphasis or accentuation 
of pressure, upon hers. And so they waited, she standing, 
he sitting, looking gravely at one another, hand in hand. 

The great red- walled room was still— the only witnesses 
of this scene, an anatomical figure exalted on its pedestal, 
a skeleton hanging meekly hideous from its little wooden 
gallows, not being companions of the talkative sort. While 


250 


The Wages of Sin. 


the atmosphere of it was rich with a warm diffused bright- 
ness, reflected down through the skylights from the sur- 
face of those masses of sun-gilded cloud still moving in 
slow procession across the pale clearness of the spring 
sky. The roar of the streets was hushed here to little 
more than a drowsy hum of bees. Colthurst had prayed 
for repose. It was granted him — good measure pressed 
down and running over, for the next few minutes at least. 
— Minutes which seemed to him an eternity in the depth 
of their healing peace. Minutes without past or future ; 
plucked out of the heart of turmoil ; sanctified, set apart. 
Minutes during which the great millstones ceased grind- 
ing, or seemed to cease — alas ! perhaps it was mostly 
seeming; — during which Time’s hurrying feet were stayed ; 
and the shadow standing at high noon on the face of the 
dial, paused, crept no further towards sun-setting and the 
night. Minutes during which the tormenting, tragic 
riddle of sex seemed solved; the baser part obliterated 
from it; appetite vanquished in the apprehension of a 
relation sweeter far than any earthly marriage — the maid 
retaining th^ completeness of her innocence, the man 
blessed, unvexed by the ache that comes alike of desire 
and of satiety. For the first time in his urgent, restless 
life Colthurst knew what it is to be content. 

With Mary Crookenden, of necessity, the experience 
was different. She had given Colthurst her hand in 
purest pity, in the unreasoning instinct to soothe him — 
somehow, anyhow, as one soothes a suffering child or 
dumb beast, careless of the means so long as the end is 
gained. But as the minutes drew on in that strange, all- 
pervading quiet, the character of her sentiment changed. 
The snow melted, the stream ran faster, the channel 
widened, deepened, the current gained in volume and in 
force. That same rage of living, stilled for the time being 
in Colthurst, began to stir in Mary Crookenden; — passed 
into her, perhaps (my sense of probability is not greatly 
staggered by the supposition), through the steady clasp of 
his hand ; but stirred in her purer, more lawful, by as 
much as her mind was more unstained than his. Hints, 
vague as yet, and misty, half-seen shapes of what life, 
love, and the inexhaustibly various spectacle of this 


The Drag on the Wheel. 


251 


majestic world — of what these may be to the elect, to 
those who have faith and courage enough to sing the 
1 Song of the Open Road/ began to dawn on her. Here- 
tofore she had lived on, looked at, the surface chiefly. 
She had even affected a cynicism now and again — the 
cynicism of ignorance, of limitation of experience. Now 
she began, feebly as yet, doubtingly, wonderingly, to 
apprehend the soul which lies in all things, beyond the 
mere outward sense and seeming of them. She was awed 
and amazed. Her eyes lost their simplicity of pity, grew 
troubled, ceased to give. Began to question, to ask, and 
out of the treasure-house of her own awakening nature, 
to receive. For the man these few minutes held a baptism 
of water to the washing away of sin. For the woman 
they held a baptism of fire to the quickening of the spirit. 

But because that same 1 Song of the Open Road ’ cannot 
be sung without strain of brain and imagination, of moral 
and spiritual fibre, the novice masters but a line of it, 
hardly that often, at a time. The harmonies of it are too 
full and rich, the rhythm at once too subtle and too vast — 
flowing, like the flowing tide when the wind sweeps in 
behind it from the ocean, and the great grey-green rollers 
swing up and break, and break again, along the shouting 
beach. To Mary Crookenden the stress of stillness, and 
of the strong working of apprehension, became painful in 
its intensity. Mutely, almost timidly, as one who asks a 
favour rather than exercises a right, she made a motion 
to withdraw her hand. Colthurst let it go without any de- 
monstration of farewell. The episode had been perfect. His 
taste revolted against marring that perfection by the 
introduction of any common-place, of sullying it by the 
most distant hint of flirtation or intrigue. 

So he sat still, watching the girl as she went back to 
the easel, and recommenced the process of packing up 
her drawing things. The best was over. High noon 
was passed ; the shadow broadened, and crept on again 
over the face of the dial, but the sun was some way from 
setting yet. For it was infinitely pleasant to sit thus and 
watch her, without apology in that pause of permitted 
silence. There are exquisitely constituted persons, whose 
smallest and most familiar actions are marked by a certain 


252 


The Wages of Sin. 


distinction. Mary Crookenden was among the number of 
these. Her movements were an admirable combination 
of decision and measured grace. Colthurst watched them 
with delight, but with a growing sense of regret. Soon 
she would have finished. Then she would speak or he 
must; and he feared any speech would of necessity go to 
break the charm, and reintroduce the conventional, social 
element. He counted the sticks of charcoal as Mary 
packed them away in her pencil case, wishing their number 
were larger and that thus the process might be lengthened 
out. 

It so happened that the last stick but one snapped. 
The longer half of it fell on to the floor and rolled across 
almost to his feet. He stooped, picked it up, rose and 
went over to the easel. The girl's eyes were still grave, 
still troubled, and her face was slightly flushed ; but she 
looked full at Colthurst, without a trace of self-conscious- 
ness as she took it from him. 

1 You are better ? ' she said. 

1 Thanks to you — yes.’ 

The charm was not broken after all. Colthurst gathered 
himself together. His old energy was reviving. There 
was much he longed to say to Miss Crookenden — now, 
while the charm was still upon them both. He spoke 
low, in rapidly uttered sentences, hesitating distressingly 
at first, almost giving way again, yet he spoke. 

1 It is u-useless to try to thank you,' he said. * You 
have done more for me than you know — than I have any 
w-wish you should know.' 

Mary was silent, but attentive, still unself-conscious. 

‘ I have b-been in hell this afternoon,’ Colthurst 
stammered. * Not the theologians' hell, in which an 
utterly just and merciful Deity is reported to roast poor 
wretches everlastingly for slight errors of doctrine ; b-but 
in one of the ordinary, every-day hells above ground, 
which we human beings display such elaborate ingenuity 
in preparing for ourselves and each other.’ 

Colthurst’s words and his manner were curiously at 
variance. The former were harsh enough and to spare ; 
the latter was quiet, gentle even. He smiled a little at 
Miss Crookenden as he spoke* 


The Drag on the Wheel. 


253 


1 Ah ! depend upon it, that hell-making business is one 
we can quite be trusted to manage for ourselves/ he said. 
1 We need no supernatural intervention to perfect our work. 
Dante, with his stage machinery of ice, and fire, and 
pitchforks, is out of it. All the required effects can be 
p-produced at a far cheaper rate than that.' 

He waited a moment, trying to keep himself in hand, 
trying to prevent breaking the charm, by any exaggeration 
of bitterness. Yet remembering Jenny, remembering 
the asphalt and the sparrows it was difficult. Bitterness 
surged up in him, all the fiercer, more acrid by contrast 
with his late realisation of content and peace. 

‘ B-but I have no wish to treat you to an essay on the 
Inferno / he said, presently. ‘That would be a dreary 
sort of return to make you. I only want to express some 
of the gratitude I bear you. I thank you for leading me 
out of the Inferno - bringing me from the stifling darkness 
of the pit into the fresh air and light again/ 

Mary made a gesture of repudiation. 

‘ I know you don't understand — that makes no differ- 
ence/ Colthurst went on. 1 1 had ten times rather you 
did not understand. B-but the fact remains. I was 
desperate, and you have reconciled me — mad, and you 
have made me sane again. You have worked a miracle 
of healing. I was consumed by self-contempt ; you have 
been very gracious, very patient with me, and so in my 
own eyes I am no longer quite contemptible. Most people 
are chary of giving up life, have rather a superstitious 
reverence for their own existence. I don’t share that 
superstition. To live, sometimes, is merely to perpetuate 
one’s own disgrace.' — Again almost uncontrollable bitter- 
ness welled up in him. He had an access of stammering 
painful to witness. — ‘ I felt that was p-pretty clearly the 
case with me just now. I am still a little doubtful 
whether my life is worth saving ; but such as it is, you 
have saved it. You have d-done more. Your purity has 
cleansed it, your pity, your kindness, for a while at all 
events, have wiped out my sense of disgrace. — You don’t 
understand. As I tell you, that is of no consequence. 
There is a good deal a woman such as you had better 
never understand about a man like me. — I seem to be 


The Plages of Sin. 


2 54 

talking wildly. In saying all you have done for me, I 
seem to be claiming too much.’ 

Every human being who is more than a mere bundle 
of clothes labelled with a name, has his hours of efful- 
gence, I suppose. Horn's when the best possible of his 
moral and spiritual capacity makes itself felt. When the 
veil of flesh grows thin, and the unlovely accretions 
formed by habit, greed, sin, the false philosophies and 
false modesties which this foolish world has taught him, 
fall away from him, and the divine image in which at the 
beginning he was made, the divine type, to which in the 
end — as we believe — he will of necessity conform, stands 
plainly revealed, giving him for the time being a certain 
grandeur and splendour of bearing. Something of this 
strange splendour was visible in James Colthurst just 
now. He moved further away from the beautiful girl, 
carrying himself well and proudly, gazing at her with a 
worship in which there was no slavishness, yet no hint 
of offence. 

* B-but I don’t really claim much, b-believe me/ he 
said. * F-for I love you. I l-love you, and I never 
expect, never hope, will never ask, God helping me, to 
come one step nearer you than I have come in the last 
half-hour.’ 

There was a silence of some duration. Colthurst 
broke it. He meant to say the whole of his say, but he 
did not care to look at Mary Crookenden as he said it. 
He stared down at the boarded floor. 

‘ 1 know a good deal about love, more than is creditable, 
perhaps, or profitable. I have had a pretty full experi- 
ence. I can gauge the quality of my own emotions very 
fairly accurately by now. I know which promise to be 
permanent, which are only evanescent.’ — Colthurst raised 
his eyes to the girl’s face again, the dignity had come 
back into his bearing. ‘And the love I bear you is 
unlike that I have ever borne any other woman. I did 
not know a man could love as I love you. I thank you 
for teaching me the secret. It is superb — it — it is cruel. 
It strings up lax moral sinews as a red-hot iron strings up 
lax bodily sinews. It is a tremendous remedy, but it 
cures. Perhaps it also kills — I don’t know about that. 


The Drag on the Wheel . 


2 55 


and I don't care. — P-pray do not imagine that I am 
making an appeal to you, Miss Crookenden, trying to 
work upon your feelings in an underhand sort of way. 
Understand I want nothing from you that most men want 
in return for their love. I want absolutely nothing, 
except this - to tell you that my love for you is there, 
established not to be shaken — there, definite, in full 
possession of me, always, waking and sleeping — never 
letting me go, holding me whether I like it not. It has 
mastered me, driven out all possibility of lower, baser, 
easily gratified sorts of love. It reigns alone. And — 
and it is hopeless — hopeless. And' — he broke out pas- 
sionately, the bitterness surging up resistless, uncon- 
trollable at last — l may God in His mercy if, indeed, 
there is a God — keep it hopeless, keep me intending, 
fully determined that it shall be hopeless ; keep me feel- 
ing, as I feel now, that the worst of all conceivable 
anguish would be to snatch a happiness which might end 
in the scorching of your beautiful feet in the flames of my 
private hells/ 

Mary Crookenden had gone back to the chair at her 
easel, and sat down. She put one hand over her eyes 
with a sort of shuddering sigh. She wanted to shut out 
the sight of Colthurst’s ravaged face. She wanted to get 
momentary relief from her overpowering awareness of his 
strong, and, as it appeared to her, fateful presence. She 
felt as though she was losing her footing, stumbling 
blindly in regions unknown and abnormal. Her old, 
unreasoning panic fear of Colthurst began to reassert 
itself. Other men had professed love for her, as we 
know; but it was love of quite another pattern. Their 
vows and ardours had been frequently entertaining, fre- 
quently frankly tiresome. All, save Lancelot's — and Mary 
earnestly and persistently strove to deny the existence of 
any sentiment tenderer than legitimate cousinly devotion 
on the part of the goodly youth— all had been dipped in 
a certain social glaze, which had rendered the surface of 
them uniform and deprived it of any rough, arresting, 
adhering quality. Sir Theophilus O’Grady, it is true, 
had vowed he should blow out his small modicum of 
brains if the young lady refused the handsome offer of his 


256 


The Wages of Sin . 


hand and heart. But Mary failed to be greatly impressed 
by these threats of self-destruction. She felt pretty 
secure he would think better of them by the time he had 
finished his dinner; and so, indeed, he did. The car- 
tridges continued to repose innocuously in the respective 
chambers of his revolver until such time as he diverted 
himself by taking pot-shots out of window at certain 
amorous cats disporting themselves on the leads at the 
back of his rooms in St. James’s Place. But this declara- 
tion of Colthurst’s was altogether new, unique both in 
form and in the prospect it opened. It did not occur to 
Mary to doubt its truth. There was in it a ring of abso- 
lute sincerity. And that made it all the more startling, 
disquieting. The girl was nonplussed, her faculties para- 
lysed by the strangeness of the position. She did not 
know what she felt ; still less did she know what to say. 

A considerable pause followed. Again Colthurst was 
the first to speak. 

1 Y-you are angry,’ he said. * I d-disgust you. 

I Oh ! no no, you don’t disgust me. Why should you 
disgust me ? But you bewilder me. You make me very 
sad,’ Mary answered. She had grown pale again. She 
had much ado to control herself. Her lower lip trembled. 

I I am sorry I m-make you sad,’ Colthurst said, gently. 

He had recovered himself, but it was difficult to him to 

keep quite still. He took an end of charcoal off the easel- 
tray, and began crumbling it absently between thumb and 
finger, watching the dry, brittle flakes as they floated 
downward in a small dusky cloud. 

‘ And yet I don’t know that I need be sorry,’ he went on. 
* Perhaps it will do you no harm to be a little sad, even for 
such an unworthy cause as me. The light natures can’t 
stand sadness. It sours them, deprives them of the paltry 
use they might otherwise have had. Best leave them alone 
to fizzle out anyhow in an atmosphere of congenial 
frivolity. But the strong natures can stand it. It braces 
and enriches them. You are strong. And so you had 
better accept it without whimpering or shirking. In the 
end you must accept it, unless you voluntarily, of set 
purpose, condemn yourself to sterility, refuse to live to the 
full of your own capacities.’ 


The Drag on the Wheel, 


25 7 


Colthurst’s fingers were still. He glanced up at her — a 
glance at once gentle and compelling. 

' D-don’t refuse/ he said. ' A-at your peril you refuse. 
Believe me all the noblest thought, noblest work, noblest 
friendship is rooted and grounded in profound sadness. 
Those divine few minutes you gave me just now, stand- 
ing here, letting me hold your hand, were the direct out- 
come of sadness so searching, so undoing, that it nearly 
— well — we needn't dwell on it — but, as I told you, it 
nearly made me throw up the game.' 

* Ah ! that is too much. You make it all terrible/ Mary 
Crookenden cried, and the tears started hot and smarting 
into her eyes. 

' I d-don't make it/ Colthurst stammered. 1 It m-makds 
itself.' 

He was silent for a little while, his fingers crumbling 
the charcoal again in their neatly violent way, the brittle 
flakes falling faster. 

' 1 suppose you call yourself a Christian, Miss Crook- 
enden ? ' he said, suddenly. 

Mary bowed her head in assent. 

' Well, then, it is obvious that you are bound to explain 
the universal riddle precisely by sadness, and nothing 
else. For the history of Christianity is about the saddest 
thing out, whether you hold the sublime old creed, which 
commands you to worship the founder of it as God — God 
betrayed, outraged, murdered, by the creatures of His 
own making who, with infinite compassion, He came 
down from heaven to save. Or whether you incline to 
the modern theory of the arrogant young Jew of genius, 
the dramatic character of whose trial and public execu- 
tion generated a morbid sentiment which has deluded 
humanity for close on nineteen hundred years, and 
drenched both the Old World and the New in blood. 
Take it either away, I don’t think sadness can go much 
farther than that. Sad ! ’ Colthurst repeated, quietly, as 
the last of the little charcoal cloud sank on to the floor. — 
'Sad, everything’s sad, fair things and foul things alike. 
Lies are sad. Truth just as sad— there’s not a pin to 
choose between the two in that respect. And yet, some- 
how, I am sure I don't know why/ he added, smiling, 


258 


The Wages of Sin , 


looking at Mary Crookenden with a certain exaltation — 
‘ truth, which just now I take to mean virtue, purity, 
honesty— a fight to keep one’s life from henceforth clean 
— truth is adorable, lies damnable, all the same.’ 

But even as he spoke, the charm was broken. And to 
him it seemed night came with a rush, the sun dropped 
like lead below fche horizon, darkness covered the face of 
the dial. The cause was simple enough. Nothing more 
dire than the voice of the hall porter announcing : — 

‘ A gentleman in the office, sir, to see you on business/ 

While at the same moment the door high in the wall of 
the theatre creaked slightly as Adolphus Carr's well-pre- 
served person presented itself upon the narrow balcony. 
If the air is highly charged with the magnetism of senti- 
ment, you must be obtuse, indeed, if you have no sugges- 
tive twitches and tinglings on first inhaling it. Colthurst 
and Miss Crookenden were standing beside the young 
lady’s easel in the centre of the large room ; their atti- 
tudes were ordinary enough, still Mr. Carr received an 
impression that his advent was pre-eminently untimely, 
that it had arrested the completion of a somewhat moving 
drama. He suffered an instant of acute indecision. Then 
with laudable discretion he requested himself politely but 
firmly to ignore and indeed if possible obliterate the said 
impression. He raised his tince-nez and gazed, mildly 
attentive, at the anatomical figure, exalted, one skinless 
arm extended, upon its red pedestal. 

In the brief interval Miss Crookenden’s manner had be- 
come reserved to the point of frigidity. She lifted her 
drawing-board down off the easel, and took up her pencil- 
case, with deliberation. She wanted to go, but she, also, 
wanted her exit to be dignified, without any effect of haste. 
In passing she bowed to Colthurst. She did not propose 
to speak. But Mary was not altogether mistress 
of herself. As she bowed she glanced at Colthurst, and 
a vague anxiety for him, a strange drawing towards 
him, half attraction, half alarm, impelled her after all to 
address him. 

‘You are better,’ she said. ‘You will not, you must 
not, throw up the game.’ 

The sun had set. But for Colthurst there was an 


The Drag on the Wheel. 259 

after-glow, a flush of unlooked gladness and splen- 
dour. 

1 N-no/ he stammered, 1 no, not just yet any way. — 
Putting an end to it all is a thing one can do any time, 
after all. I-it’s among the things that will keep. 1 

Then he went to interview Mr. Carr in the office. Pro- 
fessor Sylvester, finding leisure profitable both to health 
and the painting of pictures, had sent in his resignation. 
The Council desired that Colthurst should be sounded. If 
it was offered him, would he undertake the permanent 
directorship of the Connop Trust School ? 


26 o 


The Wages of Sin. 


BOOK V.— TWO IDYLLS. 

* L’amour est l’enfant de la Boheme.* 

Chapter I. 

The victoria bowled along at a round pace. The horse 
had not been out of the stable much lately, and was lively 
in consequence. But Miss Crookenden’s irreproachably 
appointed groom drove well, and the young lady herself 
was not troubled with nerves. Indeed, she found exhi- 
laration in the sharp pace, shaving of wheels and corners, 
forging ahead through the thronging stream of traffic. 
Miss Crookenden wore what she was pleased to describe 
as the 1 one tidy frock she had left * — the blue- grey, silver 
breast - plated garment with which . we are already 
acquainted. Over it, she had on a little cut-away coat of 
the same colour, a rolled beaver collar to it, high- standing 
at the back. The wind had changed during the night. 
There was a point of north in it giving it a drying, invigo- 
rating quality — a sufficient edge of sharpness to justify the 
wearing of a trifle of fur, though April and spring were 
here. 

Spring, indeed, was very sensibly here. London, like 
Miss Crookenden, had put on its tidy frock, which, like 
hers, was a sufficiently smart one. A certain indefinable 
go and swing was in the air, something of the vernal ex- 
citement which makes plants sprout and blossom, birds 
sing and pair. London looked, as it can very much look 
at times, massively brilliant in a broad spread lustre of 
sunshine, under a sky continental in height and cloudless 
intensity of colour. Parliament met early that year, I 
remember, and there was a good deal of season before 
Easter. Most private houses were open, their window- 
gardens radiant with tulips and crocuses, an awning 
already put out here and there. In the parks and squares 


Two Idylls. 


261 


the chestnuts wer.e breaking into flower, pyramids of pink 
and white bud standing bravely erect amid the tossing 
foliage; while a veil of fragile green was drawing over 
the heads of the sooty branched elms. Oh ! palpably, 
visibly the Spirit of Spring was abroad, and that not in 
his coy, tender-hearted, tearful humour. To-day he was 
gay, glittering, tumultuous, a bit of a rake. His hat was 
tipped over his ear, and his eyes danced with expectation 
and mischief as his feet beat the London flags. He per- 
mitted himself to cast a gallant glance at every pretty 
woman he met. Finally he stepped into Miss Crooken- 
den’s victoria, and seated himself in the vacant place 
beside her ; bade her drive dull care away, enjoy her own 
youth, wealth, and beauty, shake off a distrust and melan- 
choly which haunted her, and find life glad, diverting, 
sweet once more. 

Mary had not gone to the Connop School this morning. 
The very thought of the place made her cheeks burn, made 
her stiffen with pride — or was it modesty? — made her 
shrink away, try not to remember, not to see and hear a 
scene and words imprinted upon her mind with extreme 
clearness. The law of reaction was in full operation. It 
sent her volte face in the other direction. And this, — by 
the operation of another law, that of contraries, — all the 
more hastily, urgently, because a strange attraction drew 
her thoughts back again and again to the very scene 
and words from which she shrank. This sounds para- 
doxical. But paradox is king, if you look close enough 
over most human hearts and over the bulk of human con- 
duct likewise. Specially does he reign supreme in the 
thoughts, actions, affections of that endlessly interesting 
and somewhat abnormal product of our nineteenth century 
civilization the — modern girl. So, in obedience to the 
cross working of these laws, in obedience to the mandate 
of King Paradox, instead of being at the Connop Trust 
School by ten a.m., arrayed in workmanlike garments, 
Mary, accompanied by Mrs. Chloe, had walked to Little 
and Randeggar's in Sloane Street ; and there, after much 
deliberation over rival sumptuousnesses 1 in the piece/ 
had selected a dove-coloured brocade with knots of pale 
pink and amber roses scattered over it, which unquestion- 


262 


The Wages of Sin . 


ably would make up into a divinely lovely tea-gown. Sub- 
sequently she had spent an interesting hour with her 
dressmaker discussing the important question of spring 
toilettes. Just by the way, going out and coming back, 
she had bought a number of engaging odds and ends, 
which she didn’t particularly want ; but which looked so 
seductive behind the plate-glass of the shop windows that 
it seemed an almost reprehensible waste of opportunity 
not to transfer them to the .arms or pockets of the 
statuesque mulatto woman. 

Now she had sallied forth to pay a round of rather neg- 
lected visits. Madame Jacobini was hors de combat , pros- 
trated by headache, hence there was a vacant place upon 
the dark-blue cushions of the victoria whereon the Spirit 
of Spring could merrily, audaciously seat himself. 

Spring did his best ; he chattered away plausibly, glibly, 
and, I must add, common-sensibly enough, in his bright, 
caressing, flattering fashion. His talk brought an eagerness 
into the girl’s face. He appeased her taste, her fancy, the 
softer, weaker side of her with the contemplation of a 
thousand agreeable trivialities. He called her attention to 
all that was rich, spacious, luxurious, imposing — and of 
that the West End of London, you may be sure, presented 
full harvest on this delightful day. He obliged her to 
think of yesterday too, and his accent had a ring of 
worldly-wise mockery in it. He used the words melodra- 
matic, hysterical. Yes, Spring did his best. He tried 
cajolery, he tried laughter, he tried appeals to the inherent 
attraction of pomp and circumstance, of light-hearted 
pleasure, of impressive display. And yet, though Mary 
listened willingly, ready enough to be convinced if that 
might be, another voice continued to mingle with his. 
Hesitating, broken utterances, struck in harshly across his 
honeyed phrases and light philosophy of life , — * You are 
strong, and so you had better accept it without whimpering 
or shirking ; in the end you must accept it unless you 
voluntarily, of set purpose, condemn yourself to sterility.' 

There, — it was a positive relief when the carriage drew 
up before the Winterbothams’ house in Richmond Terrace, 
Whitehall Place, and the opposing voices were silenced for 
a while. So far every one on whom she had called had 


Two Idylls. 


263 


been out. Now her ladyship was out, but Miss Winter- 
botham was at home. Very well, then, she would see 
Miss Violet. Being late, Mary had missed her yesterday 
at Miss Aldham's. It might prove just as well to see her 
alone thus. Perhaps in a tete-a-tete that same stunted 
flower of friendship might be induced to bud and blossom. 

Miss Violet was — is still, I believe, though she has long 
ceased to bear her maiden name — an exceedingly pretty 
little person. A certain infantine roundness, downiness, 
dainty warmth about her suggesting a delicious com- 
bination of a dormouse and a ripe cherry. Her eyes 
alone did not quite please Miss Crookenden. For the 
latter had, or imagined she had, more than once sur- 
prised a singularly wide-awake and mature glance under 
those softly fringed eyelids, a glance implying possibilities. 

To-day, however, no possibilities inconsistent with 
innocent playfulness of dormouse or sweetness of ripe 
cherry obtruded indication of themselves. 

The young girl was enthusiastic in her greeting, kissed her 
guest affectionately on both cheeks, and declared — it was 
quite too charming for words of her to have come in 
though Mamma was out. They had both been fearfully 
disappointed at not seeing her yesterday. It was really 
ages, perfect centuries, since she — the speaker — 1 had 
seen her. And she had perfect oceans to say. Had 
Mary heard of the great excitement ? Victoria Barking's 
engagement to Lord Sokeington? Everybody said he 
was just as nice as nice could be, and that Pentstock is 
the most enchanting old place. They were to be married 
directly after Easter. And Victoria looked quite too 
blissful for words, she was quite off her head about him. 
And of course she was utterly absorbed in her trousseau. 
What did Mary think about trousseau linen ? She’d been 
with Victoria to a whole host of places this morning 
looking at things ; and that was why she was at home 
now. She had come in regularly fagged out. Choosing 
trousseau things was so wearing, you know. Did Mary 
like lawn, or batiste, or silk best? Victoria inclined to 
silk. Of course it was rather the thing to have it now ; 
and really some of the little silk shifties and night-i-gowns 
were simply too trottie for words. They made her ' — the 


264 


The Wages of Sin . 


speaker — ‘just a little tiny bit envious. It would be so 
awfully interesting to be getting them for oneself, you 
know. And it must be so delightful to have one so utterly 
devoted to you as Victoria said Sokeington was. To be 
The One — you know. He'd given her the most lovely 
sapphires and pearls — a necklace and pendant. Victoria 
believed they cost between eight hundred and a thousand. 
But Mamma thought not as much as that. Sapphires are 
rather down this year. For her own part, she ’ — Miss 
Violet — ‘ preferred diamonds.' 

The young lady, it may be observed, in passing, carefully 
ignored the second vowel and concluding d. 

‘ They were more useful on the whole. But then 
Victoria had got all her poor mother's diamonds, you 
see, so she could do very well for the present. 
Of course all the Barkings were off their heads about 
the marriage, though they really hadn't worked it the 
least. It wasn’t in the least a put up job. That was the 
charming part of it. Victoria declared she never was 
more surprised in her life than when he came to the point, 
though of course it had been a good deal talked about. 
He proposed, going down to Sandown, on the top of Mr. 
Abel Barking’s drag. Victoria thought they both got 
through it splendidly, for it was difficult to do it just in 
the way of ordinary conversation, don't you know, without 
anybody making out what was going on. She ' — Violet — 
* was sure she should never have nerve to settle that sort 
of thing casually on the top of a drag. Because after all 
it must make you rather hot — didn’t Mary think so? 
Supposing she was choosing, where did Mary think it 
would be nicest to be proposed to ? ’ 

Thereupon the hesitating, whispering voice broke in 
across Miss Winterbotham's high treble, while the brightly 
furnished drawing-room turned into a great bare, red- 
walled place. — ‘ I love you, and my love is hopeless, and 
God in His mercy keep me knowing, determined that it 
shall be hopeless.' 

Ah ! stammering tongue, for pity’s sake be still, 
don’t trouble us. What have we to do with sorrow, 
catastrophe, with ‘loves that never find their earthly 
close ' now in pairing time, while Spring wears his hat 


Two Idylls. 


265 


so jauntily tipped upon his ear? Be silent, leave us 
undisturbed to think in peace about matters of real 
weight and moment, — such, for instance, as Victoria 
Barking’s sapphires and silk chemises. 

1 Of course, there are the bridesmaids’ frocks to settle 
about,’ the young lady continued. 4 They’re fearfully 
interesting. And Victoria wants to strike out a new line 
which makes settling all the more wearing. They will 
have to be settled about at once, because I must try mine 
on before we go. You know we’re going to Slerracombe 
for the Easter recess ? It was quite too kind and delight- 
ful of Mrs. Crookenden to ask us. At first there were 
fearful agitations, because papa had half promised we 
would go down to Layton to the Denisons’. But we 
made him get out of it somehow, though he was rather 
worried. The poor dear old Denisons are quite too 
fussing for words when one stays with them. He’s always 
pounding away at something that wants reforming, you 
know. And it’s fearfully boring always to be talking 
about things that want reforming, don’t you think so ? And 
then I’ve been simply expiring to see Slerracombe for 
years. Everybody says it’s quite too quaint and delightful 
— so by itself, and unlike any other place. And that Mr. 
Crookenden is really quite the best host in the world — so 
good-natured and always doing nice things for people.’ 

'Yes, Lancelot is always doing something dear and 
kind,’ Mary said. 

1 He must be the most delightful cousin,’ Miss Winter- 
botham returned. 1 Only ’ — here Mary fancied she sur- 
prised a glance not wholly infantine or unsophisticated 
from under the pretty, fringed eyelids — 1 only perhaps it 
is rather a waste having such delightful people for one’s 
cousins. Of course you’re going down there, darling, for 
Easter ? ’ 

Miss Crookenden shook her head and laughed a little. 

' Oh ! I don’t know,' she answered. 4 1 wait on cir- 
cumstances. My plans are rather distractingly en lair 
every way, just at present.’ 

Miss Winterbotham confounded herself in regrets. 
Her regrets, indeed, were great almost to the point of 
incoherence. It shortly appeared that meeting Mary was 


266 


The Wages of Sin . 


the central aim and object of the visit to Slerracombe ; 
notwithstanding which Miss Crookenden rose to depart. 
The ceremony of the double embrace was repeated. 
Violet accompanied her guest to the head of the stairs, 
stood there smiling, dimpling, the softest of dormice, the 
ripest of cherries. 

1 Good-bye, darling,' she cried. *1 shall live in hopes. 
I shall be quite too disappointed for words if you don't 
turn up. I shall tell Victoria you vote for lawn. And 
your taste is always so simply perfect I am sure she’ll be 
glad to have your opinion. Look in again soon. It's too 
charming to have seen you,' and Miss Winterbotham kissed 
her finger-tips with the most captivating air of affection. 

Out into the movement of the bright street again, the 
brown horse all the gayer for the waiting. 

— * The light natures can’t stand sadness. Best leave 
them alone to fizzle out anyhow in an atmosphere of 
congenial frivolity. But the strong natures can stand it. 
It braces and enriches them. You are strong * 

1 No, no, indeed, I'm not strong,’ pleaded Mary Crooken- 
den. * I don't want to be embraced and enriched. Where’s 
the good of it ? I want to enjoy myself. I want to be happy.' 

Up Whitehall, through Cockspur Street, across 
Waterloo Place, into Pall Mall, a dazzle of sunshine in 
her eyes. But notwithstanding the dazzle she presently 
saw something which made her order the carriage to cut 
diagonally across the on-coming stream, — whereupon 
the driver of a hansom shouted at her groom, while 
the foam from his horse's bit bespattered the sleeve of her 
jacket as he dragged it aside and back on its haunches. 
Mary, however, was not apologetic. She leaned forward 
smiling, beckoning as the victoria drew up against the 
kerb. More than one person observing the young lady’s 
attitude, glanced round to discover who might provoke so 
flattering a welcome ; and passed on again with the sense 
of having seen a pleasant sight. 

For I think the fine old word debonair most fitly de- 
scribes Lancelot Crookenden as he made his way along 
Pall Mall in the sunshine that April afternoon. His 
countenance wore an expression of unruffled serenity, 
which, I hasten to add, was not in the least fatuous. It 


Two Idylls. 


267 


was too honest, too unostentatious for that. The well- 
bred young Englishman certainly possesses a happy gift 
of being smart without being showy. Upon Lancelot, 
from crown of hat to boot-sole, was neither spot, blemish, 
wrinkle, nor any such thing. Yet his raiment was as 
devoid of side as his bearing. It had no offensive 
newness about it. It was the result of himself, not 
of his tailor. He bore not the smallest resemblance to a 
walking advertisement. His clothes were all right — that 
was all. He himself was all right, likewise — sound, whole- 
some, in mind and body. Debonair, good to look upon. 

'Why, I say, Polly, how awfully lucky to run across 
you like this.' 

A light came into his quiet eyes, a glow into his smooth, 
handsome face, as he stood at the edge of the pavement 
and contemplated Miss Crookenden. 

1 You’ve cut that beastly old drawing school for once, 
then.* 

' Yes, Pve cut the beastly old drawing school, as you 
gracefully put it, for once/ she answered. 

Violet Winterbotham was quite right. He really was a 
delightful possession in the way of a cousin. Delightful to 
the point of waste ? Well, perhaps that was a question. 

' I wanted a little change of ideas. I am taking a 
whole holiday.’ 

1 And it’s an awfully jolly day for a holiday/ Lancelot 
said, still contemplating her, still quietly glowing. 

1 Yes, oh 1 no doubt it is. I had no notion you were 
here, Lance.’ 

1 Well, I only came up last night with Calmady. It 
was rather a sudden 'thing. He had to come on business, 
and Lady Calmady could not come with him. She was 
booked to go up to Scotland to her own people. And I 
thought she’d be easier if I was on hand, in case he 
wanted anybody, you know.’ 

1 You are very considerate of Lady Calmady’s comfort,’ 
Mary observed ; 1 but where are you bound for now ? ’ 

1 Oh ! nowhere in particular. I was only fooling about 
till I thought you’d be home. I meant to look in at tea- 
time. I thought Madame Jacobini wouldn’t mind — she’d 
let me wait till you came.’ 


268 


The Wages of Sin. 


Mary looked away for a moment at the string of passing 
carriages, bowed to Mr. Quayle coming down the steps of 
his club, there across the street ; then — was it in obedience 
to some whispered suggestion on the part of that mis- 
chievous young rake, the Spring ? — she swept her rustling 
blue-grey and silver skirts over to the further side of the 
victoria, and laid her hand invitingly on the vacant seat. 

1 Get in, Lance/ she said. ‘ You shall come back to tea 
all the same, if you like ; but meanwhile let us fool about 
together.’ 

Miss Crookenden smiled very charmingly. 

‘ Fooling alone doesn’t amount to much, after all, and I 
am in the humour for most excellent fooling. Come along, 
get in.’ 

( Really ? ’ he asked, slightly incredulous of such good 
fortune. 

1 Really and truly — that is, if you care to.’ 

‘ Why, of course I care to, Polly,’ the young man said. 

1 But, then, where shall we go ? The Park bores you.’ 

‘Well, that rather depends,’ Lancelot answered, while 
he arranged his long legs. ‘ I don’t fancy it will bore me 
very much this afternoon, somehow.’ 

Miss Crookenden’s eyes treated him to a lingering survey 
as they sped away up the shady side of St. James’s Street. 
Would Violet Winterbotham make him happy ? Mary 
hoped, almost prayed, that she might. He deserved to be 
happy — comfortable, reasonable, modest-natured being that 
he was. But do the modest natures always get their 
deserts ? Mary caught herself sighing. 

Just then they turned into the stir and turmoil of Picca- 
dilly, the long perspective of it stretching out bright 
ahead; currents of close-packed traffic setting steadily 
east and west, cabs and carriages showing black against 
the powdery drab of the roadway, wheel-spokes and 
panels giving off zig-zags of whiteness in the sunlight; 
the trample of innumerable hoofs ; once a slip and slither, 
which made Mary turn her head and bite her lip — a crash, 
a crowd rising up mushroom-like, amazingly immediate, a 
horse down on its side ; omnibuses, laden within and 
without, towering elephantine amid the press of smaller 
vehicles; the pavements alive, too, thick and dark, with 


Two Idylls. 


269 


foot passengers ; boys yelling evening papers. Here, break- 
ing the seemingly endless line of house-fronts on the right, 
a hoarding, a patchwork of many-coloured posters — 
sauces, tobaccos, Nestle’ s Food, full-length portrait of 
Tottie Vale as Mark Antony in ' Cleopatra Redressed,’ 
jostling announcements of Second Advent meetings at 
Exeter Hall — alas ! poor Tottie, one fears your occupation 
will be gone with disconcerting completeness whenever 
that last event takes place : — Above the hoarding masts and 
spars of scaffolding, rising up against the blue; then a 
block, the currents momentarily arrested, swerving apart 
on either side a queer little mid-street encampment — tar- 
paulin tent, piled wood blocks, brazier full of fiery eyes 
before and behind, pale flames leaping off, vanishing in the 
sunshine amid a swirl of oily vapour, execrable stench of 
boiling pitch. On the left the Green Park, genuinely green 
for once, its lawns fresh with springing grass-blades, an 
azure haze hanging above them in the distance, beneath 
the avenues of small black-limbed trees. 

All this, and much more, Mary Crookenden caught 
in passing, quick, vivid impressions — to her all the more 
vivid for that long period of work, of concentrated effort 
at the Connop School — all weaving themselves in with, 
quaintly crossing and illustrating certain thoughts which 
filled her mind, and fought out a sort of triangular duel 
there. Thoughts of yesterday, and Colthurst, and all that 
he stood for; of half an hour ago and Violet Winter- 
botham, and the radically different all which she stood for ; 
of now and Lancelot, and that which he stood for. For 
how much did he stand ? Mary was uncertain — I think, 
unfortunately. But there was something very soothing, 
undeniably comfortable, largely protective in his presence, 
as he leaned back lazily against the dark-blue cushions 
beside her amid the rush and clamour of the great, brilliant 
street. 

' Lance/ she said, suddenly, as they bore away to the 
left, round the paviors’ encampment, ‘ you are a splendid 
sheet-anchor. Virtue goes out of you ; you make every- 
thing so delightfully probable and unperplexed/ 

Lancelot regarded her with a sort of tender amusement. 
Polly’s talk was frequently a little out of his depth. On 


270 


The Wages of Sin . 


the present occasion he did not attach any very definite 
meaning to her words, but they had a pleasant sound ; they 
conveyed to him the assurance that she didn’t find him bad 
to be with on the whole. And, thereupon, to Lancelot the 
black-bodied victoria turned into I know not what all of an 
enchanted love-chariot ; the brown horse, his knees up to 
his nose, and his chest all flecked with froth, into a flight 
of Venus’ doves ; the dapper groom into Dan Cupid him- 
self. Ah ! Spring and pairing time, what tricks you play, 
even the most reasonable and modest among us. 

( I wonder you haven’t more swagger,’ the girl went on, 
in her sweet, grave voice, * considering how uncommonly 
good-looking you are.’. 

( Why, Polly, surely you don’t like swagger,’ he said, 
getting rather red and, not unadroitly, begging the 
question. 

' I am not sure. I can’t quite make up my mind. I am 
inclined to believe every woman likes swagger in her heart 
of hearts. You see if you men have a fine effect of believing 
in yourselves it helps us to believe in you. And we are 
infinitely obliged to you for any little helps in that direc- 
tion, since, even now, as things go you are practically our 
masters.’ 

The enchanted chariot turned into the Park. Venus’ 
doves, checked by Dan Cupid, flew slower. For the fine 
day had brought out not only many dowagers to sun 
themselves into semblance of life and gaiety like torpid, 
last year’s flies, but all the world and his wife, and his 
proverbial seven daughters. The riders were numerous, 
the string of carriages interminable. A few courageous 
persons even had sprinkled themselves over the ranges of 
chairs facing the Row, sparse, rather uncertain as to the 
wisdom of their own action, like the sparse, fragile leaves 
sprinkled over the trees behind them. 

1 But if one’s going to swagger one must have something 
to swagger about, don’t you know, Polly ? ’ Lancelot said. 
He wished the conversation would run in shallower and 
less bewilderingly personal channels. 

* You have plenty, at least you have what most people 
would consider plenty. — There’s old Lady Combmartin 
glaring at us out of her yellow coach. Bow to her.’ 


Two Idylls. 


271 


Miss Crookenden herself bowed, smiling brightly. I 
am afraid she took a naughty pleasure in encountering 
that venerable lady under existing circumstances. It in- 
creased the excellence of the fooling. 

‘ She is shocked. (Goodness me, how shocked she is/ she 
said to herself. ‘ She will make poor Lady Dorothy write 
yards to Aunt Caroline about it. Oh ! well, let her. Enfin , 
il fant payer pour tout. — To begin with, Lance, in respect of 
swagger, I mean, there are your uncommon good looks.’ 

‘ Oh ! I don’t know anything about that,’ he answered, 
still rather red. ‘ You're glad to have your proper com- 
plement of arms and legs, of course. But the rest seems 
to me rather frills for a man, it doesn’t matter one way or 
the other. Hornidge doesn’t drive badly,’ he added, 
looking at the groom’s neat back. ‘You’re satisfied with 
him ? He’s steady ? ’ 

‘ Perfectly, as far as I know.’ 

‘ He seemed to me a decent sort of fellow. It’s wonderful 
how well these boys out of the Brockhurst stable do turn 
out,’ Lancelot went on, relieved at having hit on a less 
embarrassing subject of conversation. ‘ It’s all thanks to 
Lady Calmady. It’s wonderful what an influence she has 
over them.’ 

Mary’s blue eyes sounded the depths of his brown ones 
for a moment. 

‘ You are very devoted to Lady Calmady,’ she said. 

‘Yes, I am awfully fond of her.’ The brown eyes were 
quiet, absolutely candid. ‘ Taken all round, she’s about — 
well, I don’t know how to put it — it sounds a little like 
spreading oneself, to say it, somehow ; but I think she’s just 
everything one wants a woman to be.’ 

Mary Crookenden was silent. She turned her graceful 
head away, glanced at the flower-beds glowing with scarlet 
and yellow tulips, glanced at the people on the footway. 
There was Anthony Hammond. He was unmistakable ; 
his coats were getting to crease suggestively round the 
waist. He was in attendance on Miss White, the player 
of the banjo, and her mother. How the little American’s 
full silken skirts fluttered as she faced up against the wind 1 

‘ I believe I am jealous of Lady Calmady,’ Mary said 
presently. ‘ And I was envious of her already.’ 


272 


The Wages of Sin. 


' Jealous, envious ? What do you mean Polly?’ ex- 
claimed Lancelot. 

I Yes, I certainly am jealous. You are there so much. 
And you admire her quite provokingly much.’ 

Lancelot laughed. He really could not help it. The 
idea of Polly being jealous on his account was too delici- 
ously absurd. Then he became slightly solicitous. Surely 
she could not misunderstand how matters stood ? 

I I like being there because Calmady and she are so 
awfully happy together/ he said gently, almost reverently. 

‘ I don’t mean they make a parade of caring for each other. 
But you can’t help knowing how they do care. You feel 
it’s there, you see, going on all the time. And, well, some- 
how it seems to do you good.' 

* Precisely. And that is what makes me envious. Lady 
Calmady made a tremendous venture, in the face of 
criticism ’ 

‘ I suppose it was rather a venture/ Lancelot put in 
reflectively, 1 Calmady being so crippled as he is, poor dear 
fellow. But then Calmady’s Calmady. He is worth 
risking a good deal for. Any way it’s all turned out 
splendidly.’ 

1 Yes, it is easy to be wise after the event. But she 
could not be sure it would turn out splendidly. She acted 
in faith. I envy the woman who has courage enough 
to trust her own judgment, whatever people say, and to 
make such a venture. It is fine. I should never have 
courage enough ! ’ 

Miss Crookenden’s grave voice had a certain ring in it. 
Lancelot did not know what she might be thinking of, did 
not see how Lady Calmady’s case bore upon her own. But 
he has an instinct that she was dissatisfied with herself, 
that she would like encouragement. There was a fund of 
generosity in this simple young gentleman. Regardless 
of self, he gave encouragement. 

1 Oh ! you'd find you had courage fast enough, Polly, if 
you cared/ he said, smiling at her. 

1 But how is one to know when one cares ? ’ Mary 
rejoined. She turned away and nodded over the back of 
the carriage to Anthony Hammond and his ladies as she 
spoke. 


Two Idylls. 


273 


Lancelot glanced at the delicate contour of her cheek, 
the soft outstanding of shadowed blonde hair under the 
upturned edge of her blue-grey and silver bonnet, the 
easy grace of her blue- grey and silver-clad figure. Then 
he fixed his eyes steadily, resolutely upon Hornidge, the 
groom. The outward aspects of his cousin were only too 
seductive. Lancelot was well aware of that. He tried 
not to think about them. To his mind there was a touch 
of unworthiness, a wanting in the perfection of respect in 
thinking about them. To him Polly was sacred ; and, by 
a turn of feeling which I own appears to me fine rather 
than foolish, he therefore reckoned it little short of profane 
to suffer himself to dwell on the spectacle of her beauty. 

1 Oh ! I don’t think it’s so very difficult to know whether 
one cares or not, when one does care,’ he said quietly. 

But now, fortunately perhaps, for our young people’s 
talk was unquestionably drifting into dangerously senti- 
mental waters, as the carriage turned northward, skirting 
the railings of Kensington Gardens, who should cross 
them but Lady Louisa Barking driving her celebrated pair 
of cobs. Her sister, Lady Alicia Winterbotham, more- 
over, was with her. The meeting, recognition, acknow- 
ledgment on both sides of such recognition was 
necessarily of the briefest, for the cobs trotted fast and 
Dan Cupid, escaped from the string, let the doves have 
their pleasure again as to pace. The meeting occupied 
but an instant. But in an instant, oh ! dear me, how 
much can be conveyed when there is the intention to 
convey it ! The daughters of the noble house of Fallow- 
feild disapproved highly ; and they contrived very 
effectually to let Miss Crookenden know as much. 
Their well-bred countenances, the set of their small and 
remarkably well-shaped mouths — all the Quayles -are 
wonderfully alike — intimated in the clearest possible 
manner that, in their opinion, unless the situation was 
explained by subsequent events — which Heaven forbid, 
for what then became of Violet’s neatly planned little 
future ? — Miss Crookenden was guilty of a startling indis- 
cretion, of a grave disregard of social good taste, in thus 
driving about all alone, right in the world’s eye, as you 
may say, with that very eligible youth, her cousin. 


T 


*74 


The Wages of Sin. 


And Mary, after a movement of righteous anger — 
for what anger is not righteous first off in the estimate of 
the enraged one ? — at the impertinence of this adverse 
criticism, was seized with compunction. Her fooling 
ceased abruptly to have any quality of excellence in it. 
She feared it was culpably thoughtless, if not positively 
heartless. Was this the way to promote Lancelot’s peace 
of mind, and push him into Miss Winterbotham’s pretty, 
wide-open arms ? She knew it was not. As our wilful 
young lady gazed silently at the pleasant sunshiny scene, 
— the riders, walkers, carriages, the wide road and white 
bridge spanning the gleaming water of the Serpentine just 
ahead, the rise of green sward beyond the Powder Maga- 
zine dotted with heavy-fleeced sheep, the azure haze, pale 
repetition of the blue sky above, which overlaid the distance, 
— trees, houses, vistas between the big elms on the left in 
Kensington Gardens, with a soft uniformity of tint, — she 
became a trifle ashamed of herself. With haste, ill-con- 
sidered haste as it proved in the upshot, she tried to 
rectify her mistake, to retrieve the position. 

1 1 was coming away from the Winterbothams when I 
met you/ she said. 1 1 am so glad they are going to you 
for Easter. Violet was radiant. It suits her to be radiant. 
She really looked quite delicious. I hope you like her, 
Lance ? ’ 

Lancelot had quite recovered his serenity. The look of 
tender amusement had come back. Mary found that look 
embarrassing, somehow. 

1 Oh ! yes, I like her well enough. She’s a very nice 
girl as girls go. My mother wrote and told me she’d 
asked them. But I am afraid I had almost forgotten 
about it.’ 

* Don’t forget/ Mary said. ‘ You had much better 
remember. I am delighted you are going to have them.’ 

‘ Are you, Polly ? Why ? ’ 

Now this really, if you like, was embarrassing. Mary 
took her courage in both hands. 

‘ Because I want you to like Violet a little extra-much. 
It would be such a comfort, Lance, such a real comfort to 
know you found her a great deal nicer than other girls, as 
girls go.’ 


Two Idylls. 


27 5 


Mary’s eyes sounded the depths of these honest brown 
ones again. 

' 1 should be glad to know that/ she said. ' Very glad, 
indeed. Dear Lance, I am very fond of you, you see. 1 
so want you to be happy.’ 

For a minute or two only the light crunch of the 
carriage wheels, and thud of the horses’ hoofs on the 
smooth gravel of the road, voices floating up clear and 
shrill from a company of children sailing toy-boats near 
the Receiving House of the Humane Society, the excited 
barking of a dog for whom sticks were being thrown into 
the gleaming water. Then Lancelot said slowly : — 

'Well, you know, Polly, if you want me to be happy, 
it’s easy ’ 

'Oh ! Lance, dear old boy, don’t say anything foolish/ 
Mary broke in hurriedly, imploringly. 

She perceived the woful futility of her bit of diplomacy. 
It had been ill- calculated indeed. It had precipitated the 
crisis instead of warding it off. She went very hot. The 
remembrance of Victoria and Lord Sokeington’s little affair 
on the top of that drag of Mr. Abel Barking’s intruded 
itself in the most provoking manner. She desired, genu 
inely, actively desired, now that it was rather late for such 
desires, to spare the goodly youth pain. 

' Dearest Lance, pray, pray hold your dear tongue. 
Pray don’t say anything foolish. I can’t forgive myself for 
having asked you to drive with me, like this. It was 
selfish, it was stupid. I shall reproach myself so horribly 
if you say something foolish.’ 

' There's nothing to reproach yourself for — nothing in 
the world/ he answered. 'You’ve given me an unex- 
pected good time this afternoon, that’s all. And I’m not 
going to say anything foolish — any way it doesn’t seem a 
little bit foolish to me.’ 

Again the hoof-strokes, the soft crunch of the wheels as 
the enchanted chariot rolls onward over the sunny bridge, 
the yapping of the dog, the children's clear voices. Then, 
his head held high, his smooth young face rather pale, a 
tremor about his lips, with a sort of gentle desperation, 
Lancelot asked her : — 

4 Polly, will you have me ? * 


276 


The Wages of Sin. 


Chapter II. 

As has already been stated, Madame Jacobini had a 
headache. But, her habitual vivacity notwithstanding, 
Madame Jacobini also had her pieties. And to-day, if 
her head had been at its soundest, she would still have 
remained at home and refused herself to visitors. For 
this was the anniversary of Signor Jacobini’s death. Nine 
years ago to-day that irascible musician had taken leave 
of a state of existence with which he had proved himself 
singularly incapable of coping successfully, and had 
entered upon that other one in which — I say it with all 
reverence — one hopes things may be a little less mixed. 

For that radical mixedness of things here below had 
contributed largely to the poor Signor’s undoing. His 
was one of the lop-sided erratic natures which give such 
an infinitude of trouble to themselves and everybody who 
cares for them. He belonged to the unlucky order of 
persons who possess the temperament of genius without 
possessing any sufficient practical talent to act as safety- 
valve and carry off the alarming rush of steam genius is 
continually in process of generating. Such persons are 
worthy of all commiseration. In the abstract one regards 
them with the tenderest pity. In the concrete one too 
frequently finds them insupportable. 

Signor Jacobini was wedded to his art; but I cannot 
pretend to say the marriage was a happy one. Music was 
to him a seventh heaven, being caught up into which he 
heard and saw things unspeakable. Yet, of course, he 
wanted to speak them. What artist does not? During 
the period of inception he was ravished with ecstasy — 
filled with a divine fury. During the period of execution, 
or attempted execution, he was usually filled with a fury 
of quite another kind. Alas ! his compositions were not 
even second-rate — second-rate, I mean, among the modest 
English musical efforts of the day. Poor little things, I am 
not so cruel as to judge them by any universally obtaining 


standard ; that would indeed be to sink them in the mud. 
— And, having a measure of clear-sightedness in him, long 
before the celestial message was set down on the music 
score, Signor Jacobini had begun to make this lamentable 
discovery for himself; he became conscious that, ecstasy 
notwithstanding, he was in the act of producing anything 
but an immortal work. And then he became anything 
but good company. He fell upon himself. He tore him- 
self to pieces. And, as so often happens in such cases, 
he involuntarily extended the area of tearing. It began 
with himself, it went on to his dearest, because his 
nearest. Madame Jacobini was severely torn too. 

But to-day, as she lay back against the piled-up pillows 
on a sofa in Miss Crookenden's pretty drawing-room — 
screening her eyes with a fan, alike from the clear fire 
burning on the tiled hearth, and from the sunlight slanting 
in through the lace curtains of the further room and 
chequering the white panelling and the space of elaborately 
patterned pale apricot-coloured silk damask on the wall 
above — it was not of these unamiable tearings that Sara 
Jacobini thought. Four days out of five the poor Signor 
had been ill to live with ; and so his widow just missed 
out the four, and bade memory dwell only on the fifth, 
when he had been repentant of ill-temper, child-like, merry 
with the jovial inconsequent mirth which was commoner 
a quarter of a century or more ago, I think, than it is in 
our tiresomely wise and wide-awake to-day. She recalled 
his witty speeches, his practical jokes, his inimitable gift 
of mimicry, his inexhaustible fund of anecdote. Oh ! 
decidedly, it seemed to her in looking back on those fifth 
days, that on them poor dear Jacobini had been capital 
good company. She had taken him for better and for 
worse. Now she elected only to remember the better. 
Not that she took any merit to herself for this. She w r as 
spontaneously loyal. At the time she had not made capital 
out of her domestic infelicities, and required admiration for 
cheerful endurance of them. Madame Jacobini belonged 
to a social period and social stratum in which what I may 
call the theory of the husband and the comparative anatomy 
of the honourable estate were not discussed by wives, 
affectionate or otherwise, with the unsuperstitious freedom 


278 


The Wages of Sin. 


customary at present. And she was certainly not going to 
make capital out of those infelicities now. That would 
have appeared to her a most ungracious waste of time and 
energy. Madame Jacobini had no capacity for nursing 
grudges. She let the dead bury their dead, with all 
possible despatch, in regard of what was disagreeable. 
And so it was the brighter aspects — the entertaining, 
whimsical, pathetic episodes — of her twenty years' ex- 
perience of married life which held her memory. She 
pondered these things in her heart as she rested there alone 
and headachy in the charming white and apricot-coloured 
room, the atmosphere of it fragrant from the scent of 
violets and the delicate odour of greenhouse-grown roses 
— pondered them with liftings of the eyebrows, brief ejacu- 
lations, humorous little grimaces, though now and again 
her eyes filled. Ah ! depend upon it, the grass grows none 
the less fresh and green upon the graves of those we have 
loved for being warmed by a sunshine of kindly laughter 
as well as watered by tears. 

So Madame Jacobini leant against the pillows and 
remembered, while the chequered shadow cast by the lace 
curtains slipped across damask and panelling nearer to the 
window. Yes, looking back was sweet on the whole, not 
bitter. The earthly relation had closed in tenderness; 
the final scenes, though played out amid poverty and failure, 
had been peaceful. She had sailed her marriage-ship over 
troubled waters, and had brought it safely into port at last. 
And she sighed with a certain movement of gratitude think- 
ing of that. 

And then her thoughts passed from the accomplished 
voyage of her own marriage-ship to other possible hymeneal 
sailings. She looked forward. She questioned herself as 
to Mary Crookenden. Frankly, she was not satisfied about 
the girl. She watched her closely, and it seemed to her 
that she detected an increasing restlessness — moodiness 
almost — in her. Mary was reticent. But straws show 
which way the wind blows. Madame Jacobini was a great 
observer of straws. The straws gave conflicting evidence 
in the present case. She was puzzled. 

i Her staying at home to-day, after months of early 
breakfasts, and unheard-01 application and diligence ' — 


Two Idylls. 


279 


Madame Jacob ini let her fan drop on to her lap — 1 1 do not 
fathom it. I cannot divest my mind of the notion that 
the tame Tartar counts for something in the business.' 

She unfurled the fan, and again let it drop together with 
a little rattle. 

‘ I wish the tame Tartar further, oh ! distinctly I do,’ 
she said to herself. 

Just then the carriage stopped, the bell rang. Miss 
Crookenden came quickly upstairs and entered the room. 
She paused just inside the door, and it so happened that 
the shrinking sunlight fell on the silver embroidery of her 
dress. She appeared singularly fair and tall, proud as 
some young Amazon in her glistening armour. Her face 
was a little hard in expression. Her eyes shone large 
and sombre amid the colourless lustre of her complexion. 

' Asleep, Sara ? ’ she asked. 

'No, my dear, not in the very least,’ the elder woman 
replied genially. ' I have been squaring my accounts with 
the past this afternoon, and I find I have a nice little 
balance in hand on the side of thankfulness. How goes 
the world with you ? ’ 

' It goes all awry,’ the girl answered — ' execrably awry. 

I have not a pen'orth of balance on the side of thankfulness.’ 

She divested herself of bonnet and over-jacket, and 
threw them into the nearest chair. 

' Your head better ? ’ she asked, pausing in the midst of 
this somewhat unceremoniously conducted operation. 

Madame Jacobini permitted herself to tell a little fib. — 

' Oh ! yes, quite well,' she said, though her eye-balls felt 
red-hot and seemed to bore back and back into her brain. 

' Then there is a trifle to be thankful for after all.’ 

Mary came over and sat beside her, let herself slip down 
against the cushions till her head rested on her friend’s 
shoulder, fondled her hands as they rested on her lap. 

' Sara, I am in a fix — I am in a hole,’ she said. 1 I don’t 
quite know what to do. I am pulled in so many different 
directions. I have come to four cross-roads, and I can't 
decide which to take. Looking along each I see a lion in 
the path.’ 

' Dear me, the visits must have been remarkably event- 
ful/ observed Madame Jacobini. 


280 


The Wages of Sin. 


1 Oh ! it was not the visits. I took my worriments out 
with me. But worriments always have power to add to 
their number. I met Lancelot.’ Mary pressed coaxingly 
a little closer . — ‘ Sara, I want comforting/ she said. 

1 Would you mind putting your arms around my waist ? — 
so — that’s right. You are sure your head’s better, and 
that I don’t bother you ? — Generally, you know, I can keep 
the dear boy in order and prevent his burning his fingers ; 
but to-day I was stupid and self-absorbed, thinking about 
the cross-roads and the worriments. It was horrid of me ; 

I ought to have been more careful ; and he burnt his fingers 
badly — very badly. And it was hateful to see him burn 
them ; all the more so because, instead of being angry and 
giving me the slating I deserved, he bore the pain like a 
hero, like a saint.’ 

* Ah — ah — ah/ murmured Madame Jacobini softly, in a 
falling cadence. 1 You have decided against that one of the 
cross-roads, then ? ' 

Mary raised her head . — ( How can I help it, Sara ? ’ she 
said. 1 1 care for him too much to think of marrying him.’ 

1 Heaven help us, what a reason ! ’ cried Madame 
Jacobini. 'It is certainly left for the latter end of this 
marvellous nineteenth century to discover that affection is 
a valid argument against marriage.’ 

1 It is quite true, though,’ the girl said. 4 1 have thought 
it all out.’ 

‘ Ah ! you all think too much ! * 

1 It is only prudent to think,’ Mary Crookenden answered. 

1 Supposing I did as he wants me to do, and then later 
found I was bored, how horrible for him ! It is much 
kinder to make him rather unhappy now than run that 
risk. You see Lance is incapable of being bored. At the 
end of a hundred years he would be just as dear and kind, 
just as ready to indulge and take care of me, as he is now. 
There would be nothing accidental in the business. One 
would always know precisely where one was. I can map 
it all out — London, Slerracombe, Slerracombe, London; 
high respectability, a model menage , Aunt Caroline’s dis- 
pleasure abating as time went on, and — and — as there 
came to be appeasing grandchildren ; Lancelot irreproach- 
able in every relation of life, and nothing, nothing to look 


Two Idylls. 


281 


forward to. Never the least ripple of adventure to stir the 
surface,’ 

Mary’s head went down again on her friend’s shoulder. 
— ' Sara,’ she said, ' 1 think there is nothing more beauti- 
ful than that sort of life ; just husband and children, 
putting aside the development of one’s own nature as some 
women can, and using any gifts one may have simply to 
make one’s people happy — merging all private ambition in 
ambition for the second generation. I am not sure that it 
is not the ideal for us women — what we were originally 
intended for. But though I admire it, I cannot rise to it.’ 

‘ You have thought it all out, indeed,’ murmured Madame 
Jacobini. 

' 1 am not equal to that — yet. To settle down to it is too 
great an act of self-abnegation. I dare not risk it — no, I 
daren’t. Supposing, as I say, five or six years hence 
I found it intolerable ? No, I can give no sufficient secu- 
rities. It would be wicked to let Lancelot invest all his 
capital of future happiness in me. Don’t you see that it 
would ? ’ 

' You are too logical,’ .the elder woman said, 'you are 
far too reasonable. You do not allow enough for modifica- 
tions of time, of habit.’ 

‘ You mean, after a while, one would get conveniently 
dull, go round like a horse in a mill ? I don't see the 
fun of condemning one’s self to be a horse in a mill.’ 

* Are you not a little perverse, my dear ? ’ inquired 
Madame Jacobini. 

1 Indeed, indeed, Sara, I am trying to do what is right,’ 
Mary said in her grave tones. She raised her head, and 
kissed her friend’s cheek. 

Those kisses were very disarming. Madame Jacobini 
held the girl close and tenderly. She yearned over her, 
she was distressed for her. For it seemed as though this 
young creature might have put to sea in such safe and 
pleasant sort, had she only been minded to do so; might 
have stepped on board a marriage-ship, furnished with 
sails of silk and masts of sandal, and made a life’s voyage 
over such very tranquil and sunny waters. But she was 
not minded to do so. She asked excitement and adven- 
ture. Only too probably she would get them, for in the 


282 


The Wages of Sm. 


long run we all of us do get very much that which we ask. 
And when they came, in what spirit would she meet 
them ? Madame Jacobini was sorry. But she did not 
protest. She had no faith in trying to make any one happy 
against his or her will. 

* Well, we have disposed of one road, then/ she said 
presently ; ' how about the others ? ' 

Some time elapsed before the girl answered. She had 
drawn a little away, sat with her head bent, playing idly 
with the fan lying on the elder woman’s lap. It cost her 
something to speak. 

' Sara/ she began, getting at her point in a rather 
roundabout fashion, 'it is an admitted fact that I am 
changeable, isn’t it ? ’ 

' Fully admitted, I think/ the other said, not without 
malice. 

' Should you despise me very much if I acted up to my 
reputation, and threw over my work at the Connop 
School ? ’ 

Madame Jacobini was taken by surprise. She opened 
her mouth, and brought her teeth together with a slight 
snap. It was a snap of relief, of satisfaction. 

' On the contrary, I shall be glad/ she answered. 1 1 
never cared very enthusiastically about your going to the 
Connop School. And since the tame Tartar has been in 
possession, my last drop of enthusiasm, as I think you 
know, has evaporated.’ 

Mary drew away a trifle further. 

' Mr. Colthurst has been very kind to me. He has taken 
a lot of pains with me. He has done all in his power to 
help me.’ 

‘ I can credit it/ Madame Jacobini exclaimed, not with- 
out irony. 

' 1 shall always be grateful to him — always/ the girl 
continued. 

' By all means, my dear. Gratitude for benefits received 
is most becoming. But one can imagine circumstances 
under which it is perhaps just as well cultivated at a dis- 
tance from the benefactor.’ 

'You are very much prejudiced against Mr. Colthurst/ 
Mary said. 


Two Idylls . 


283 


1 1 confess he has not taken me by storm on the three 
or four occasions when I have had the honour of encoun- 
tering him/ 

‘ He is very clever/ Mary said. 

* In these days that is no distinction. Every one is 
clever — hideously, detestably clever/ 

Miss Crookenden rose, and with a certain deliberation 
put another log on the fire. From among the glowing 
embers flames sprang up to meet it. The girl knelt on 
the fender-stool, watching the tongues as they licked 
greedily round the flaky edges of the wood. 

‘ Most people's cleverness is merely a pose/ she said ; 
* it doesn’t amount to much. It rubs off when you get to 
know them. We've all been clever because cleverness has 
happened to be the fashion lately. In a year or two the 
fashion will have gone out, and then we shall be gloriously 
stupid again/ She paused a minute. 1 Mr. Colthurst's 
cleverness is not subject to fashion. It is ingrained. He 
can’t help it. I don’t believe he could be stupid even 
if he tried/ 

* Poor man, how frightfully exhausting I * Madame 
Jacobini commented with feeling. 

Mary still watched the tongues of flame clasping the wood. 

‘Yes, it is frightfully exhausting, too exhausting for 
me ; and that is why I don’t propose going back to the 
Connop School again. The demand he makes is too 
great; I am not equal to meeting it. I must give up 
trying to be modern, and professional, and all that. It 
is beyond me. Of course it is disappointing — tremen- 
dously disappointing — but I must resign myself to re- 
entering the ranks of ordinary, common-place young 
womanhood.' 

She stood up, her back to the fire, and her hands clasped 
rather tightly behind her. 

* If I had courage and conviction enough to give myself 
over, and just submit to be taught — turn sponge and drink 
it all in, you know — I believe I might do a good deal under 
that fine teaching. But I have not the courage to turn 
sponge. There are foreign bodies in the water. I daren't 
drink them in. They're not good for me — or I imagine they 
are not. I get frightened/ 


284 


The Wages of Sin . 


Mary paused again, and then laughed, with an effort to 
throw the whole matter aside. She was more affected than 
she cared to own. She did not want her friend to gauge 
the depth of her feeling. She did not enjoy plumbing 
that depth herself indeed. Accurate knowledge of it 
seemed to her to trench on danger. 

‘ Oh ! I am afraid I am a very twopenny-halfpenny 
sort of young person, after all, Sara/ she said, 
‘ whose affairs don’t merit any such careful consideration. 
I am feeble, deplorably feeble. That’s the fact. I daren’t 
take this risk, I daren’t take the other — always a lion in 
the path. I shall end by muddling my life contemptibly 
before ■’ 

And there she stopped abruptly. 


Chapter III. 

That Hannah, the parlour-maid, advanced salver in hand, 
on the salver a visiting-card, that this usually impertur- 
bable handmaiden was slightly ruffled, none too well 
pleased with her commission — all this Madame Jacobini, 
from her station upon the sofa, saw clearly enough. It 
vexed her, for her head ached viciously and the pieties 
demanded seclusion. But she saw more than this, and for 
that overplus and extra Hannah’s advent with the visiting- 
card appeared insufficient cause. Miss Crookenden’s 
attitude was peculiar. She was looking towards the 
doorway. Madame Jacobini did not command a view of 
the doorway. 

1 Who on earth is it ? ’ she exclaimed, suddenly becoming 
nervous. She had a conviction something was going to 
happen — something she should not the least like. * Who 
on earth is it ? ’ she repeated ; but Mary did not answer. 

The girl’s features had stiffened, so, indeed, had her 
whole frame, with a sensation part resentment, part an 
emotion strangely vital and intimate. It was new to her. 
It angered her. It made her eyes dilate, and sent the 
blood tingling down to her finger-tips. And side by side 


Two Idylls. 


285 


with the anger a gladness — a gladness not without an 
element of alarm in it She had no need to read the name 
on the visiting-card. The owner of both had followed 
hard on the heels of the parlour-maid. And his high- 
shouldered figure was very evident now in the doorway, 
dark against the light of the stairway behind. Erect, the 
fingers of his left hand dragging at his shirt collai, 
Colthurst waited on the threshold, looking across the 
daintily-furnished, white and apricot-coloured rooms, with 
their bowls of violets set on quaint stands and tables, 
their tall bushes of tea-roses, their books, pictures, bibelots , 
their effect of graceful luxury, to where their fair young 
mistress stood before the dancing fire in her suit of fairy 
mail. 

Madame Jacobini and Hannah spoke simultaneously. 

I Who is it, Mary ? Is there time for me to beat a 
retreat ? * 

I I said you were engaged, ma’am. But the gentleman 
in«isted he must see you. He said he would not detain you. 

Hannah’s tone was decidedly sniffy, heavily charged 
with self-defence. 

Miss Crookenden glanced towards her friend. * There’s 
not time — I mean, please stay,’ she said. 

For the next few seconds Madame Jacobini’s brain 
worked rather too fast for comfort, considering that same 
vicious headache. For as Colthurst crossed the room for 
the first time she measured the inherent weight and power 
of the man, became sensible of the engrossing, absorbing 
force that was in him — saw and felt him, not off the 
surface as she had done hitherto, but by the quickened 
vision that comes often with a highly-strung condition of 
nerves. A headache may be a very illuminating medium 
through which to view matters sometimes. 1 The creature 
reminds me of a whirlpool,' she thought . — 1 Woe to the 
woman who falls into it. She will spin and spin helplessly 
till she is swallowed up.’ — And then she looked hard at 
Mary Crookenden. We have said Madame Jacobini’s 
sense of drama was acute. Something in the girl’s atti- 
tude, a strainedness, a sort of holding of herself down and 
in, which Madame Jacobini saw, or fancied she saw, 
caused her very acute discomfort. — ' Good Heavens 1 poor, 


286 


The Wages of Sin. 


dear, foolish, unfortunate child/ she said to herself. The 
kindly-hearted woman was quite overcome, lost her savoir 
faire , lost her readiness of speech and action for the time 
being, leant back against the piled-up sofa cushions, a 
profound sense of regret upon her. Alack for that silken- 
sailed marriage-ship ! Madame Jacobini would willingly, 
joyfully have given every penny she possessed to see the 
girl safely on board of it as Lancelot Crookenden's 
promised bride, still better as his wedded wife. Mean- 
while, as I say, she lost her readiness. The crisis had 
come upon her with a rush. She could not tell how to 
act for the best, how to interfere. In her confusion she 
missed Colthurst’s first words, failed to apprehend the 
purport of his rapid speech. 

I You think I have no b-business here, Miss Crooken- 
den/ he was saying, with disconcerting abruptness. ‘ 1 
seem to be guilty of an intrusion. I am afraid I did not 
stop to consider that carefully. It was necessary that I 
should ask your opinion about a matter of considerable 
importance to myself,- and indirectly to others as well. As 
you were not at school to-day, I came off here as soon as 
I could get away.' 

The substance of Colthurst's address was personal, but 
his manner of delivering it was impersonal. He had him- 
self very well in hand. Notwithstanding the excitement 
generated in him by Mary Crookenden's presence, by the 
fact of finding himself here in her house and home, Colt- 
hurst managed to take up the purely official, dogmatic tone 
which he had preserved in his intercourse with her during 
the past eight or ten weeks. He wanted no melting. 
Melting was precisely that which would defeat his purpose 
in coming here. He was true to his singular declaration 
of yesterday. His will was firm against any lessening of 
the distance that divided him from Miss Crookenden. He 
looked at her as little as possible, nor did he look about 
him. This was an occasion when the perception of 
attractive external details was carefully to be avoided. 

The girl had no answer to make to his statement. She 
motioned him towards the sofa. 

I I think you know my friend, Madame Jacobini/ she 
said, as loftily as she could. 


Two Idylls. 


287 


For Mary also wished to keep the tone of this interview 
down to the level of their ordinary intercourse. But that 
queer gladness took part against her wishes, against her 
social sense. She made a brave stand ; but from the first 
she had a disturbing suspicion that she was playing a 
losing game. 

Colthurst bowed mechanically to the sofa and any body 
or thing that might happen to be on it. Then he addressed 
her again : — ‘ The matter in question is this, Miss Crook- 
enden. Sylvester has resigned. They have offered me 
the p-professorship. Shall I accept it ? ’ 

Mary hesitated. Her first instinct was to congratulate 
him. Her charming eyes kindled. Then prudence gained 
over sympathy. 

‘Really, 1 am quite incapable of giving an opinion on 
the subject/ she said, coldly. ‘You must know best 
whether the appointment is likely to prove a help or a 
hindrance to you. I cannot judge.' — She clasped her 
hands again rather tight behind her. — ‘ What have I to 
do with it ? You have no right to make me responsible 
in such a serious matter, Mr. Colthurst.’ 

‘ Ah ! but you must inevitably be responsible/ he ex- 
claimed. ‘ You can’t help it I can’t help it either. The 
whole question turns on your wishes, your desires.’ 

Colthurst spoke very fast — so fast that once more 
Madame Jacobini failed to catch his exact words. But 
she saw Mary lift her head as in proud annoyance, saw her 
eye-lids droop, and her face flush. The good woman sat 
on thorns. Yet what to do ? — she asked herself in grow- 
ing alarm — what had already taken place between them, 
and how far had it gone ? She was all in the dark. She 
must wait on events, lest she should get hold of the stick 
disastrously by the wrong end and so make confusion 
worse confounded. 

Colthurst, meanwhile, was sensible that he had slipped 
somewhat. He turned away, restlessly, took a small 
trefoil-tailed china monster — representation of the sacred 
dog Toh, plainest-headed among hounds — off the chimney- 
piece just behind him, and began twisting it about, gazing 
at its goggle eyes and benignly-grinning mouth. It steadied 
him to have something to handle, in a sense to torture, 


288 


The Wages of Sm. 


Inwardly he cursed the shrewd, kindly woman sitting on 
the sofa. If she would go, if she would only remove 
herself 1 But evidently she did not intend to remove 
herself, and he had a delicate thing to say to Miss 
Crookenden, a thing which might easily be misconstrued. 
It was almost impossible to say it before a third person. 
Yet he had come with the express purpose of saying it. 
He did not mean to depart until it had been said. But 
Madame Jacobini’s silent inspection and observation 
harassed him. He was beginning to lose his nerve. So 
he determined to say it at once. He faced round, spoke 
louder and more deliberately, though in so doing he knew 
he risked an outbreak of stammering. If the woman 
would hear, well, let her hear, then — and make what she 
could of it. 

1 What I came to ask you is this/ he said. ‘ You have 
not been to the school to-day. I am afraid I have 
d-divined why you did not come. Social, conventional 
fetiches intruded themselves. They intimated that the 
Connop School might be an embarrassing, equivocal sort 
of place for you after — well, after what occurred yesterday. 
And you had not quite d-daring enough to defy the fetiches. 
Wasn’t it so ? ' 

Madame Jacobini leaned forward, fanning herself. She 
was all eyes and ears just then. 

* Merciful powers ! What next ? ' she ejaculated under 
her breath. 

Colthurst was one of those inconvenient persons who 
have the gift of compelling you, willy nilly,to speak the truth. 

‘Yes, it was,’ Mary Crookenden assented; while her 
glance followed the motions of the man’s handsome hands 
playing in their neatly violent way with the little china 
monster. 

‘ And the conventional fetiches were wrong, as they 
usually are, Miss Crookenden. Pray understand on:e and 
for all,’ Colthurst said, quietly, * that the very la: t thing I 
intend is to be a nuisance to you ; to traffic on past kind- 
ness; to b-bore and pester you with my affairs, my 
susceptibilities, my attacks of blue devils. Gratitude is not 
always a lively sense of favours to come, though it may 
amuse cheap cynics to say so. I assure you I have a very 


Two Idylls. 



sufficient capacity for holding my tongue if needs be. 
Y-yesterday, I was p-pressed beyond endurance. I lost 
my head. But I shall not lose it again. I have taken 
measures to prevent the recurrence of the pressure of 
yesterday which I have no doubt will prove effectual.' 

Colthurst paused a moment. His expression was not 
exactly saintly, and Madame Jacobini, glancing from 
the man to the girl as they stood together on the 
hearthrug, could not but be struck, in the midst of all her 
anxiety, by the telling contrast thty offered. Light and 
darkness, night and morning, beauty and the beast. 
Nevertheless, she admitted a certain grandeur in the 
beast. 

1 So, in as far as I am concerned, in as far as your work 
at the Connop School is concerned, you can draw a wet 
sponge across your memories of yesterday — wipe them 
out, obliterate them, if you desire it.’ 

1 Ah, but I can't do that/ the girl cried almost in- 
voluntarily. 

Colthurst’s breath came very short. His face grew thin 
as he looked at her, and the look was heavy with a ques- 
tion. But Mary had retreated upon the sofa. She leaned 
against the arm of it close to Madame Jacobini. Her back 
was to the light, her face and figure in shadow, only a 
yellow-red glint of the fire here and there upon the silver 
embroidery about the hem of her dress. Colthurst’s 
fingers closed like a vice upon goggle-eyed Toh. 

1 Then it only remains for me to ask you to be so kind 
as to tell me p-plainly whether my accepting the director- 
ship of the school will prove an objection to your coming 
there in future ? I shall be grateful if you will answer 
me frankly ; b-because, if it proves so I shall decline the 
appointment.' 

He said the last few words very simply. His taste may 
be called in question at times. His sincerity, I am happy 
to say, never. Yet it was no slight matter to him, that 
proposal to decline the appointment. For to-day had been 
big with triumph as yesterday with defeat. He had felt 
the pulse of his school to-day ; found that it beat true, 
loyally, towards him. A deputation of students had 
waited upon him with enthusiastic demand that he would 

n 


290 


The Wages of Sin . 


continue to reign over them. Much pleasing feeling had 
been exhibited towards him, many pleasant words spoken. 
For, indeed, it appeared to the majority of these sixty and 
odd young people that the daily routine of frog-pond 
existence would become deadly dull if King Stork should 
abdicate, and some good, ordinary, uneventful King Log 
mount the throne. King Stork might bully and overwork 
them ; might be exacting and merciless; his criticisms 
might be harsh, even scathing ; but he knew what he was 
about, and he made them know what they weie about also. 
He managed to educe whatever fraction of cleverness might 
be in them. The spirit of discipleship was abroad in 
Connop School ; they entreated him not to leave them. 
And the excellent Barwell seconded their vote of confidence 
with much complimentary tail-wagging. Colthurst wore 
him nearly to fiddle-strings, it is true, as personSjOf strong 
vitality inevitably wear their weaker brethren. But wear- 
ing thin in a good cause appeared to Mr. Barwell of the 
nature of a privilege. Colthurst had come to form one of 
the principal interests of his life. Where would agreeable 
suspicion of adventure be, where those ticklings of surprise 
and wonder he so relished ? He must bid good-bye to all 
hope of witnessing fireworks, sustaining electric shocks, if 
Colthurst ceased to rule over him. So he too cried, stay. 
Colthurst was touched, grateful. He rejoiced in his work, 
rejoiced to make his ideas obtain and prevail, rejoiced to be 
thus free to preach his gospel to fit audience ; by no means 
despised either the certainty of a secure and, for himself, 
sufficient income. And so it was no light matter, surely, 
for him to come thus and offer to throw over all these 
alluring prospects to save chance of embarrassment to such 
a very impenetrable damsel as Miss Crookenden seemed 
bent on proving herself. Verily Love makes most 
thoroughpaced simpletons of the ablest among us ; woe- 
fully perverts judgment, making the worst appear the better 
reason, making us fling aside indisputably solid advantages 
in favour of the shadow of the merest shade. How shall 
we regard you, Love ? Shall we adore or detest you for 
this crazy miracle-working of yours ? Is the madness you 
engender divine or brutish ? Probably, rightly con- 
sidered, something of both. 


Two Idylls. 


291 


And now Colthurst, in obedience to that sweet madness, 
repeated his offer — making it, in itself, appear a small 
matter, thanks to the reasons he adduced in support of it 
— being filled, meanwhile, with the almost voluptuous sense 
of satisfaction which comes, at the first blush anyhow, from 
the performance of any genuine act of self-devotion. 

'You have an unusual amount of talent/ he went on; 
' and you owe it to yourself to give that talent the fullest 
training and exercise obtainable. It mustn’t be balked, 
stunted, frustrated, as women’s talents generally are, by 
inadequate teaching, by timid nasty-nice notions of the 
degree of knowledge which is safe and suitable for their 
sex. And that’s why I have come to you now, Miss 
Crookenden. The Connop School is the only place here 
in England where your talent will receive anything like 
fair play. So you must stay there. And if my staying 
there too is an impediment, stands in the way of your 
staying ’ — Colthurst turned away and put the little china 
monster back on the chimney-piece — ' very well, then, I 
must go,’ he said. ' They’ll easily fill my place. II riy a 
pas d' homme necessaire, you know. So don’t hesitate to say 
what you wish. Yes or no — it shall be just as you please.' 

There was a momentary silence. Then Mary said 
gently, gravely — ' You are very magnanimous.’ 

Once more Colthurst knew what it was to be content. 
'Not so very magnanimous/ he answered, ' since in 
pleasing you I take the very b-best possible means of 
pleasing myself.’ 

But here Madame Jacobini arose mentally from the state 
of prostration into which headache and the abnormal 
character, both of the visitor and his communications had 
plunged her. 

' Plague the man, he becomes abominably attractive, 
abominably coercive/ she said to herself. ' This won't do. 
He must be snuffed out.' 

She rallied her forces, marshalled her scattered wits, 
rushed in valiantly where angels— comprehending the 
whole drift of the business, as it is only civil to suppose that 
superior intelligences would — might have feared to tread. 

' Oddly enough, we were just discussing this very 
question — weren’t we, Mary ? — when Mr. Colthurst was 

TT o. 


292 


The Wages of Sin. 


announced/ she declared briskly. 'The question of the 
prosecution of Miss Crookenden’s studies, I mean, at the 
Connop School. I will tell you all about it, Mr. Colthurst. 
Miss Crookenden needs change; I have long thought so ; 
now she admits it. We had agreed — hadn’t we, Mary ? — 
just arrived at the conclusion — ’ here Madame Jacobini 
reached up and patted the young lady’s knee, as the latter 
leaned on the corner of the sofa, including her and the 
dark figure standing on the hearthrug, in one of her widest 
and most genial smiles — 'just arrived at it when you, Mr. 
Colthurst, appeared so opportunely though unexpectedly 
upon the scene. Just agreed that the time had come when 
the Connop School must be reckoned among the things of 
the past. Miss Crookenden has enjoyed her work there 
immensely,’ she continued vivaciously leaning forward, 
nodding at Colthurst with imperturbable amiability — 
' haven’t you, Mary ? And no doubt profited by it also. 
That I take for granted under such able tuition. But even 
the most enjoyable things must come to an end, you know, 
Mr. Colthurst. There is a limit set to our most agreeable 
experiences.’ 

As she finished speaking, Madame Jacobini rose. She 
intended to snuff the man out, once and for all to show him 
his place ; but it was not quite a nice thing to do. She 
could not help being sorry for him. Yet, as it had to be 
done, she proposed doing it thoroughly. Not a smoulder 
of red should be left in the wick. 

' Miss Crookenden’s connection with the Connop School 
is severed,’ she went on, using her hands in a very telling 
bit of pantomime descriptive of cutting off uncommonly 
short. ' It is most courteous and considerate of you to 
call, Mr. Colthurst, and give us this information about your 
appointment.’— Madame Jacobini’s smile widened, grew 
largely, richly genial. — 'But you see, as far as Miss 
Crookenden enters into the question you have arrived the 
day after the fair. The case was already closed. The 
verdict, funnily enough, just given. —I am afraid it is 
rather late to offer you tea. It seems to have got dusk very 
quickly to-night. Shall I ring for the lamps, Mary, as I 
am up ? ’ 

Madame Jacobini congratulated herself. She had 


Two Idylls. 


293 


handled the snuffers to some purpose this time, or she was 
very much mistaken. Had let the man down with a slam; 
soused him up to the neck in common-sense ; had drawn 
his poison-fangs, and need have no further anxiety in his 
direction, at present. She moved across to the bell. 
Hannah and lamps, she thought, would finish him off) 
complete his discomfiture. 

Colthurst moved also. Came right in front of the girl, 
still leaning or the corner of the sofa, her slim grey form 
somewhat impalpable in the deepening twilight. 

‘ G-good-bye, Miss Crookenden,’ he stammered. ‘ Your 
friend has very kindly saved me from all possibility of 
misapprehension. Her explanation of the situation has 
b-been m-most masterly.' 

Colthurst put two fingers inside his shirt-collar and 
wrenched it outward. He felt he had been fooled, shamed ; 
and it made him a little mad to have his self-devotion 
flung back thus, like a dirty rag, in his face. 

‘ I resign you to the undisturbed worship of the conven- 
tional fetiches — for that’s what it really means, what it all 
really comes to,’ he said, bitterly. ‘ Worship them in peace, 
supported by the approval of all right-minded persons of 
your acquaintance ; selling, as such persons always press 
the artist to sell it, your birthright for a mess of paltry 
social pottage. And yet I am sorry,’ he added, with a 
sudden change of tone ; ‘ very sorry. It seems a pity; for 
the social fetiches are secure of plenty of worshippers, any 
way, and you are capable of worshipping better things ! ' 

‘Ah! no,' Mary answered. ‘You have over-rated me, 
you have romanced about me, you have — ■' 

But here suddenly, her voice faltered, broke. She stood 
upright, stretched out her hands in swift violence of entreaty. 

‘ Oh ! leave me alone, please leave me alone,' she cried. 

‘ You are too strong for me, too great for me. I can’t cope 
with you. You bruise and hurt me. I lose my identity ; 
you break me all to pieces. Leave me alone, oh, leave me 
alone, Mr. Colthurst,' she said. 

Hannah and lights. The face of the woman he loved 
seen for an instant blanched, strangely troubled, piteous 
in its child-like distress. Then the open door, the chill of 
the spring evening in the lamp-lit street. 


294 


The Wages of Sin . 


‘ D-damn doing right/ was what Colthurst said to him- 
self. 

And in the white and apricot-coloured room, meanwhile, 
a long silence. The two women sitting side by side 
again. Madame Jacobini was affected, slightly remorseful. 
She had snuffed the man out, disposed of him ; but no, 
decidedly it was not a nice thing to do. Mary’s silence 
disturbed her, moreover. 

‘ Was I right, darling child ? ’ she inquired at last. 

‘ Quite right, Sara ; but — but — ' the girl shuddered, 
and her breath caught hysterically, ‘ Oh ! Sara, hold me 
tight. Love me, comfort me, I am very unhappy/ she 
said. 

‘ My dear, my dear/ murmured Madame Jacobini. Then 
she determined to probe the wound and discover if it was 
of dangerous depth. So she asked the time-honoured, 
ever-recurring question, which, simple though it is, covers 
most of the misery of every woman’s life : — ‘ Do you care 
for him, Mary ? ’ 

‘ 1 don’t know, I hope not, because it would be utterly 
useless for me to care.’ Miss Crookenden spoke slowly, 
wearily. ‘ There is something behind, something horrible, 
tragic — I don’t know what, and I would rather not know. 
He hinted at it yesterday.’ 

‘Did he ? ' exclaimed Madame Jacobini. 

Remorse vanished. She began to feel quite comfortable 
over her use of the snuffers. Again silence, broken only 
by the roll of carriages. At a house just across the street 
there was a dinner-party, matting let down over the pave- 
ment, an awning put out, a row of children and perambu- 
lators drawn up to right and left watching the arriving 
guests. 

‘ He gives me a feeling nobody ever gave me before/ 
Mary went on presently. 

‘ Does he ? ’ murmured Madame Jacobini, with meaning. 

‘It is a terrible feeling, Sara. It scares me. I don’t 
know where it would lead to.’ — Mary pressed her face 
against her friend's shoulder, and shuddered again. — ‘ I 
must get rid of it, get rid of it at all costs. Sara, should 
you mind my going down to Brattleworthy to Uncle Kent ? 
I know you don’t care for the country till the year is well 


Two Idylls. 


295 

aired ; but I could quite well go alone — with Chloe, I 
mean. I know I am cowardly, but I should be so thankful 
to get into the dear, clean restful country, where every- 
thing seems simple, less perplexed. 1 

'You shall start for anywhere — Central Asia by the 
night express, if that will make you happier. But Brattle- 
worthy/ Madame Jacobini’s eyebrows went well up into 
her hair, ' it is next door to Beera Mills and — my dear, I 
don’t want to plague you by suggestions of further per- 
plexity — but — que faire ? It is useless to blink the truth. 
At Beera is the clerical Admirable Crichton waiting for his 
answer.’ 

' I have thought of all that. But perhaps he won’t be 
at home. He’s been a great deal at Aldham Revel since 
poor Lady Aldham’s illness took this bad turn. Miss 
Aldham told me so yesterday.’ 

' Still, railways exist, I believe, and it is open to him to 
take a ticket and come home again. He will come home 
again,’ Madame Jacobini added with conviction, ' and that 
promptly, when he learns you are at Brattleworthy. 
Don’t lay the flattering unction to your soul, that you are 
going to slip out of making an answer, Mary. You gave 
him a note-of-hand, payable at seven months. The young 
man is punctual. He is not in the very least likely to 
forget to ask for a settlement.’ 

' Oh 1 very well then, let him ask for it.* 

Mary kissed her friend lightly on the cheek. She had 
recovered her composure. She left the sofa, went over 
and knelt on the fender-stool, watching the now bright 
fire; up-leaping flames once more eagerly clasping the 
flaky edges of the vrood. 

'I don’t mind if he does ask for it, Sara,* she said 
quietly. 1 Indeed, I am not sure that I should not be rather 
obliged to him if he did. For, of all the various lions, the 
one in that path really seems to me the least dangerous 
and objectionable.' — She paused a minute. — ' I am not at 
all sure Mr. Aldham is not part of the restfulness. There 
are no hidden things in his life I dare not know. If he 
still wants me he may have me — for he gives me no 
feelings.’ 

* Good heavens 1 ’ cried Madame Jacobini, ' there is 


296 


The Wages of Sin. 


another of your perverted nineteenth-centuryisms ! It has 
indeed been left for modernity to discover an argument in 
favour of a suitor’s eligibility in the fact that he leaves you 
as cold as a stone.’ 

Miss Crookenden ignored the small sarcasm. 

'He is good/ she continued, 'and not at all stupid. Marry- 
ing him would be remarkably safe, and just now I have a 
perfectly gluttonous appetite for safety.’ — She put her hands 
on to the mantelshelf, and drew herself up into a standing 
position. — ' I’ll telegraph to Uncle Kent to-morrow, and go 
down the day after, if you really don’t mind. — Dear me, 
there’s the gong. Don’t you bother about dressing, Sara, 
you’re tired ; and I won’t be five minutes hustling into my 
frock.’ 

Just then her eyes lighted on dog Toh, lying grinning 
on the mantelshelf — dog Toh in two pieces, snapped right 
across his sacred middle. Mary started, and that odd 
shuddering ran through her once more, while the colour 
rushed into her face. She was angry with herself, yet an 
unreasoning gladness re-awoke in her. Then, very care- 
fully, she picked up the pieces. 

' Ah ! he’s broken,’ she said. ' I m ust stick him to- 
gether again.’ 

And she carried goggle-eyed dog Toh away with her 
up to her room. From which may it not be surmised that 
Madame Jacobini's use of the snuffers came a trifle — just a 
trifle — late ? 


Chapter IV. 

It was Easter Eve. The sea like a great pale turquoise, 
the sky like a great pale sapphire ; their meeting veiled in 
banks of opalescent mist, fading almost imperceptibly into 
the opaque blue below and the clear blue above. The bare 
treeless land across Yeomouth Bay, where it rose above 
the mist, a mosaic of frail yellowish pink, lilac, yellowish 
dun. A little fleet of white-sailed coasting vessels stand- 
ing out to sea, till the flowing tide should serve to carry 
them in over the bar to the broad still reaches of the 
estuary. Along the bar a broken line of butter-coloured 


Two Idylls. 


29; 


sand-hills edging the blue water. At the far end of them 
the lighthouse, showing like a splash of whitewash against 
the warm lilac of the hilly country inland — which rises, 
one swelling upland above another, to the wide quiet of 
the purple moor. 

All this Cyprian Aldham saw as he turned out of the 
steep lane on to the high road at Beera Cross — saw it 
with the approbation beautiful scenery invariably called 
forth in him. But he did not linger. He had no inclina- 
tion this afternoon for brooding intercourse with Nature. 
He took in the fair land- and sea-scape at a glance, and 
let it hang in the background of his mind as a pleasing and 
therefore suitable drop-scene against which the drama of 
his thoughts and affairs might play itself out undisturbed. 
For aspects of Nature were an accessory to-day, and the 
private concerns of Cyprian Aldham undoubtedly occupied 
the first place in Cyprian Aldham’s attention. Moreover, 
he was in a hurry — in as much, that is, of a hurry as a 
person of so cool, direct, and well-regulated nature can be. 
Evening service in the small church clinging against the 
wooded combe-side was at seven o’clock, and it was nearly 
four now. Aldham proposed walking to Brattleworthy 
Rectory, and being back in decent time for the said ser- 
vice. He could not therefore afford to loiter. He stepped 
out at a good pace along the high road, — here bordered by 
strips of coarse grass and heather, interspersed with little 
thickets of bramble and blackthorn, of willow in full glory 
of furry grey and yellow catkins, of stunted oaks and 
hazels ; and shut in, on either hand, by high earth-banks 
topped with gorse and gemmed with innumerable prim- 
roses. 

The air was light, exercise pleasant, and Aldham in that 
condition of serene self-complacency which serves persons 
of refinement and high cultivation in lieu of the vulgar 
animal spirits common to low-caste humanity. And 
indeed the young man had very fair cause for self- 
complacency. He had long purposed certain things, and 
in the last week had realized that which he purposed. 
Three days ago, without marked enthusiasm, it is true, 
but also without hesitation, Mary Crookenden had accepted 
him, had definitely promised to become his wife. Aldham 


298 


The Wages of Sin . 


was in love, genuinely in love, according to his capacity 
of loving. That capacity is, of course, very different in 
different individuals, and his capacity was not that of a 
St. Preux any more than of a Don Juan. His was a 
perfectly sane affection, not a bit likely to get out of hand, 
kick over the traces, indulge in violences and eccentricities 
of devotion. It was the sincere preference of a proud 
and perhaps hard man for one woman as distinct from 
all other women, though he did not for a moment profess 
to think the woman in question a perfect being. On the 
contrary, Aldham considered that his mistress was not 
insusceptible of improvement in many directions. Some 
men's love is formative, educative ; is convinced, not only 
of the high desirability, but of its own entire capacity, of 
adding finishing touches to the mind and character of the 
beloved one. Aldham acknowledged many duties on the 
part of the husband to the wife. — Let it not be supposed 
for an instant that I refer to such crudities of right conduct 
as being faithful to and not beating her. They belong to 
a level of practical morality, or rather immorality, to which 
the young clergyman was incapable of descending, even in 
thought. The duties he acknowledged were of a much 
more civilized order. — Aldham, believing sincerely in the 
superiority of the masculine intelligence, proposed to 
mould his wife, to modify some of her tendencies, root 
out some of her inclinations, teach her much that it would 
be greatly to her advantage to know. His judgment 
would be her final court of appeal; his wishes in all 
serious matters her rule and law. The time was young 
yet, but Mary had displayed a degree of gentle submission 
towards him during the last few days which was altogether 
flattering and encouraging to his educative hopes and 
intentions. 

1 1 have been wise/ he said to himself, bestowing a 
glance on the blue of the bay over the top of a gate as he 
passed. 1 She asked me to wait, and I waited. I was 
very patient, and I did right. Now her choice is deliberate. 
I think we fully understand one another.’ 

Bold words, betraying perhaps a measure of inex- 
perience in our admirable young clergyman. For do two 
human beings — specially of opposite sex — ever fully 


Two Idylls. 


299 


understand one another ? Have any two ever done so 
since the world began ? History and personal observation 
alike answer in the negative, I fear; for, alas! the finest 
and liveliest imagination stops short of complete com- 
prehension of the thoughts, aims, predilections, of even 
the nearest and best loved. For is not each one of us, 
after all, under sentence of something very like perpetual 
solitary confinement in the prison-house of our own in- 
dividuality ? 

But it was not only that Cyprian Aldham had attained 
in the matter of his annexation of Miss Crookenden. 
That morning he had heard of the death of his aunt, Lady 
Aldham, and this event made a considerable difference in 
his prospects. Cyprian felt at liberty to contemplate the 
poor lady's death chiefly from the standpoint of his own 
fortunes ; for it had been long expected, in a sense long 
hoped for, and 'might justly be considered to be what is 
often rather euphemistically described as a ‘ happy release.' 
Over fifty years of easy comfort, of the sheltered existence 
wherein no rough word is ever heard or rough sight seen, 
all the luxuries of the harem, in short, without its 
disabilities and restrictions — for, upon my word, it some- 
times occurs to one that women of the upper classes here 
in England often have a quite unreasonably good time of 
it — this followed by a strange reverse, by six months 
of such pain and disgust as give the lie to human 
progress and laugh the efforts of our vaunted science 
to scorn. Disease is a famous leveller. Neither wit nor 
virtue, neither wealth nor position, houses or land, move 
Siva the Destroyer to spare when he is minded to 
strike. He sends out his emissaries, and they do his 
bidding relentlessly. In this case he ordained that a 
delicately-nurtured woman should die of cancer, and of 
cancer she accordingly died. But the process was a slow 
one, — the gods can afford to take their time, having all 
eternity at their disposal, — and during the process certain 
changes took place in the poor lady's attitude of mind. 

Like so many charming women of her class, Lady 
Aldham was undisciplined, and consequently slightly 
vindictive, unreasonable, unjust. The demands upon her 
forbearance and submission having been rare, those graces 


300 


The Wages of Sin. 


had grown somewhat rusty, and failed to present them- 
selves in good working order when Providence mercifully 
supplied her with an opportunity for their employment. 
She had, for many years now, been offered such an 
opportunity in relation to her husband’s nephew and heir, 
Cyprian Aldham. For the young man's existence was, in 
plain English, a perpetual vexation to her; he had 
embodied, to her, the great disappointment of her life. 
She had gone on hoping against hope for the child who 
would render his claims abortive. But the child never 
came. Cyprian, meanwhile, certainly was not guilty of 
intruding himself, his behaviour was laudably circum- 
spect; but Lady Aldham found offence in his very 
circumspection. It irritated her. He put forth no claims, 
gave himself no airs of a moneyed 3 r oung man ; worked 
hard, took a good degree ; went into the Church ; was 
licensed to a London curacy very much more distinguished 
for its opportunities of labour than for its social advantages ; 
broke down in health ; went abroad as bear-leader to 
Lancelot Crookenden ; buried himself in an obscure West 
Country parish. Had he been obsequious, had he 
flattered a little, made up to the poor lady, she would 
probably have forgiven him the iniquity of his existence ; 
but the independence he showed was merely a fault the 
more. To many women it is the unpardonable sin that 
you should give them no trouble, keep out of their way, be 
quite well able to do without them. 

But when Siva stretched out his hand against her, as 
we have said, Lady Aldham’s attitude of mind changed. 
She desired to make her peace with the young man ; but 
she desired something more than this. She loved her 
husband jealously, exclusively. And Sir Reginald was a 
handsome, jovial, vigorous, middle-aged gentleman, tender- 
hearted and light-hearted at the same time. He was 
inconsolable for his wife’s sufferings, prospectively incon- 
solable for her loss; but Lady Aldham had a terrible 
suspicion that the Inconsolable eventually of necessity 
seek consolation, just as surely as the Thirsty seek water. 
It is the moderate griefs that wear long, that kill — if, 
indeed, any griefs kill — not the noisy ones. Suppose Sir 
Reginald should seek consolation in the form of a second 


Two Idylls . 


301 


helpmeet ? Suppose he should pay his wife the compli- 
ment — we are assured it is a high one— of giving her a 
successor ? Suppose that successor should triumph 
where she had so lamentably failed ? Suppose 
children's toys should one day litter the great stately 
rooms downstairs, children’s shouts and laughter echo 
along the wide passages ? Such thoughts, to Lady 
Aldham, were almost more cruel than the hand of Siva 
pressing on her poor tortured body. And being a woman 
of sincere though not very enlarged belief, she went a 
step further, asking the question asked by the Sadducees 
in Judea of old. — At the last, when they met again in that 
other world which was now drawing so solemnly near to 
her — coming forth out of the silence and mystery which 
had heretofore shrouded it, and confronting her as her 
only permanent reality — whose husband would Reginald 
be ? To whom would he belong, this man whom she had 
loved, whose name she had borne ? To her, or to that 
other Lady Aldham ? Put baldly thus, such questionings 
sound almost grotesque. Yet these are the things the 
majority of us really do brood over, turn hither and thither 
with weariful persistence, as we lie a-dying — carrying on, 
in queer, not unpathetic simplicity, all the familiar furniture 
of our daily thought, what one may call the small-clothes 
of our domestic and social circumstance, into the unknown 
regions ahead, where such little garments are probably 
very much out of fashion. 

And so from a double motive she proceeded to make her 
peace with Cyprian Aldham. In proportion as Sir 
Reginald cared for his heir-presumptive, he would be 
unlikely to run the chance of dispossessing him by 
marrying again. From being an object of dislike, the 
young clergyman found himself suddenly converted into 
an object of high consideration. He regarded this as a 
not unfitting reward for his past conduct, accepted it 
gladly as such; ministered to the poor lady in things 
spiritual in perfet good faith, having no notion that he 
was being erected as a barrier against the intrusion of 
some not impossible second Lady Aldham. For the 
present owner of that title could not bring herself to speak 
of the jealous fears that beset her. Moreover, she read 


302 


The Wages of Sin. 


the young man’s character clearly enough to see that an 
appeal to self-interest would certainly not succeed with him. 
So she took refuge in committing the keeping of her hus- 
band’s soul to him as a sacred trust. Even humbled herself, 
asking as pledge of forgiveness for past coldness that 
he would spend the greater part of his time in future at 
Aldham Revel. ' Marry and live with your uncle, save 
him from a lonely old age,’ this was the woman’s cry. 
Inwardly she added, 'save me from the humiliation, the 
agony of a supplanter.’ She pressed the matter upon her 
husband, referred to it again and again, until the idea of 
such an arrangement became familiar to both gentlemen. 

And it is odd how soon the mind accustoms itself to 
some new ideas. A year ago, had anyone suggested to 
Aldham he would contemplate giving up clerical work, and 
settling down as recognized heir-apparent to a big estate 
and big fortune, he would have repudiated the suggestion 
almost angrily. But now it had ceased to be in the least 
shocking to him ; indeed, during the brief period of his 
engagement it had grown increasingly attractive. Aldham 
Revel would unquestionably be a very much more suitable 
setting for Mary Crookenden than the dull little vicarage 
at Beera. How Sir Reginald would admire her 1 How 
she would impress the neighbourhood — the dear, dignified 
old Mainwarings, the Selfords, the Adnitts of Lowcote, 
good-natured Mrs. Jack Enderby and her train of strapping 
boys and girls at Bassett Darcy ; and the airified pleasure- 
seeking little world of Tullingworth, always sitting on the 
edge of its chair — though it doesn’t a bit like one to say 
so — in hopes of recognition from ' the county.’ 

Now to-day, along with the announcement of his wife’s 
death, had come a kindly word from Sir Reginald concern- 
ing his nephew’s engagement and a renewal of the request 
that he would pack up and betake himself to Aldham 
Revel, bringing his bride along with him. ' You know 
how much your poor dear aunt thought about it,’ he wrote. 
* Almost the last talk I had with her she spoke of it. The 
notion had taken great hold of her, somehow. I hope you 
will see your way to carrying out her wishes.’ 

As he turned down over the top of Brattleworthy Hill, 
between the straggling row of whitewashed, slate-roofed 


Two Idylls . 


303 


cottages, Aldham was decidedly of opinion that he did see 
his way to carry out the said wishes. The period of 
doubt and indecision was passed. He could find a 
hundred-and-one excellent reasons for accepting the agree- 
able station in life to which it appeared to be the pleasure 
of Providence to call him. When inclination jumps with 
fate conscientious scruples are soon stilled, as a rule. 

Passing beyond the cottages, Aldham opened a field 
gate on the right and struck across the steep pastures. 
Below him lay the church and rectory half hidden by a 
plantation of oak and beech which shelters them from the 
west ; the square mass of Slerracombe House ; the diver- 
sified expanse of the park — its wooded valleys a patchwork 
of raw umber, rosy brown, ethereal green, lying between 
stretches of heather, golden gorse, succulent fresh-sprung 
bracken ; — then the turquoise sea meeting the sapphire 
sky amid banks of opalescent mist, and the finely-tinted 
mosaic of far-away country. About half a mile out from 
shore some black-hulled skiffs from Beera, all, even to tan 
top-sails set to catch the light south-easterly breeze, heel- 
ing a little as they slipped along with the quaint curtseying 
motion which comes of the pull-back of the heavy trawl at 
the stern. Jackdaws and choughs, showing like a handful 
of glossy black seed thrown upward as they suddenly 
wheeled out in shrill vociferous companies from their 
nesting-places in the cliff face. Deer moving down from 
the open grass park near the house, to the mottled sunlight 
and shade of the valleys. A couple of buzzards soaring 
up and up in intersecting circles, on motionless, wide- 
spread, blunt-tipped wings. The ‘ wandering voice ' of the 
first cuckoo, bold and blithe, in pertinacious repetition of his 
own gay name. And there, finally, fairest sight of all — 
for, as has been said, the young man was truly in love 
according to his capacity — on the high rising ridge of the 
next field, just before him, Mary Crookenden herself. 

Aldham did not stay to open the gate. He laid his hand 
on the top bar and vaulted over it, performing this athletic 
feat very neatly. Not without inward sense of satisfaction, 
too, for he was glad to know himself to be in as good con- 
dition physically as he was well assured of being intel- 
lectually and morally. Aldham dearly liked to have the 


304 


The Wages of Sin. 


whole of himself at command. He pushed on and was 
more than half way up the slope of turf before Mary 
became aware of his presence. Then, catching sight of 
him, she waved her hand and stood awaiting his approach. 

To Cyprian her solitary white-clad figure — the curious in 
costume may be interested in learning that she wore a 
dress of white flannel — outlined against the sky, bare- 
headed, the sunshine lighting up the dim gold of her hair, 
seemed to gather up and embody the sweet, pure influences 
of that spring day. She appeared as very fit presiding 
genius of the bright, far-reaching landscape; while a charm 
of bird notes rose about her from thicket and woodland, 
and the soft breeze stirred her garments, swept away 
through the rectory plantation just below, and filled the 
sails of those curtseyirfg skiffs out at sea. Aldham had 
an admirably retentive memory. He quoted some lines 
from Wordsworth, some from Matthew Arnold; and sin- 
cerely congratulated himself at the same time, on his 
excellent taste in the choice of a wife. His mental 
barometer stood as ‘ set fair.’ 

Nor was Mary’s greeting calculated to depress the mercury. 
She was gentle ; her graciousness had a pretty touch of de- 
precation in it. She seemed genuinely anxious to meet his 
wishes. She listened dutifully to all he had to say, admitting, 
when any slight difference of opinion arose, the justice of his 
arguments. All of which was just as it should be, the educa- 
tive, formative process happily inaugurating itself thus early 
in their joint career. Aldham was extremely pleased. He had 
hardly reckoned upon such docility on the part of his 
pupil. He enjoyed a most satisfactory three-quarters of 
an hour walking up and down the rectory pasture in the 
sunshine, refused tea, and started back in capital time for 
his evening service as well satisfied a young man of high 
culture and clear intentions as you are likely to meet. 

The result of the interview may be stated briefly thus. 
The wedding, for which no date had as yet been fixed, was to 
take place in June — about six weeks hence. It was to be 
quite quiet, in respect for Lady Aldham's recent death. 
After a short honeymoon, Cyprian and his wife would 
take up their residence at Aldham Revel. On Tuesday he 
would go to the latter place to attend the funeral; Mary 


Two Idylls. 


305 


would travel up to London with him, and turn her attention 
seriously to the important matter of her trousseau. If 
Kent Crookenden could be prevailed upon to do so, he 
should go too, and then all business regarding settlements 
could be disposed of. 

* Really it is delightful to find we understand each other 
so thoroughly/ Aldham said to himself as he followed the 
lane leading into the mile-long combe down to Beera again. 

1 Ah, good evening to you, Parris/ he added. 

But Bill Parris, on his way to a preaching up at the 
dreary little hamlet of Codd’s Camp — in honour of which 
pious exercise he had put a remarkably short-waisted, full- 
skirted, shiny black broad-cloth coat over his canvas trousers 
and jersey — vouchsafed no intelligible response to this 
greeting. With his lazy rolling gait he lounged on, his 
hands in his pocket, and wild blue eyes fixed on the turn 
of the steep lane just ahead. Yet presumably he did 
recognise Mr. Aldham, and remembered moreover certain 
news concerning that gentleman current in Beera, of which 
his sister, Mrs. Sarah Jane Kingdon, had informed him that 
very morning, for he muttered as he went : — 

1 Marrying marryin' and giving in marriage — same tale 
now as back along in the days of the patriarch Noah. But 
the Lord'll reward mun for their foolishness and the hard- 
ness of their hearts. He shall overthrow the ivory palaces 
in which they trust, and cast mun out into the wilderness. 
There shall be wailin' and gnashing of teeth. And the 
saints shall rejoice against mun, and laugh mun to scorn. 
Praise the Lord/ he said, 1 He’ll bring down the pride of 
the lot of 'em and drag it in the dust.' 


Chapter V. 

Left alone Mary Crookenden fell into a considerable 
meditation, the immediate effect of which was that she 
went across the sunny pasture, through the plantation into 
the ugly whitewashed rectory (for all the world just like 
the house a child draws on a slate) and up to her 
bedroom. There, from an inner pocket of her travelling 

x 


30 6 


The Wages of Sin. 


bag, she extracted a flattish oblong box of old Dutch silver. 
Armed with this, and having ascertained that the Rector 
was still out in the parish and not likely to be back till 
near dinner time, she sallied forth again ; made her way 
down into the deer-park, crossed the stream and turned 
up the grass path which, after passing across the hillside, 
showing like a winding ribbon of green amid the darker 
tones of the heath and gorse, dips over the shoulder of the 
hill to Red Rock Mouth. 

She walked slowly, as was indeed only seemly, for she 
was about attending a funeral. The oblong silver box 
was, in point of fact, a coffin, containing a body symboliz- 
ing much. But whether that body was already a corpse 
or not Mary was not quite certain. Yet uncertainty only 
made her more anxious to complete the obsequies ; for it 
appeared to her if a measure of life were still left in it, 
burial, deep, uncompromising, final, was even more neces- 
sary than if it was already well dead. 

The subtleties of the feminine mind are infinite, its 
capacities of playing hide-and-seek with its own motives 
and desires not to be gauged. Yet even in the case of 
that most complex development of female humanity, the 
modern young woman, there is, more often than not, an 
underlying simplicity and, when it comes to a push, an 
innate rectitude with which the casual male observer would 
certainly not credit her. She has suspiciously liberal and 
cynical fashions of speech, as she has, too frequently, 
suspiciously loud and dashing fashions of dress; but 
beneath these are a pure mind and fair well-favoured body, 
singularly unspoiled and undistorted by the cut of the 
garments in which the taste of the hour has impelled her 
to clothe them. 

And it was precisely this abiding simplicity and inward 
rectitude which prompted Mary to set forth now, and do 
her best to bury that little corpse (as she trusted) and all 
which it symbolized. Upon good resolutions it is sadly 
easy to go back, especially for a young lady proverbially 
prone to change her mind. But upon an outward act, 
however quaintly parabolic, it is not so easy to go back. 
Shave your head when you swear, and you are much more 
likely to keep your oath, be sure, than if, trusting to the 


Two Idylls. 


307 


compelling power of your own high sense of honour 
merely, ,you remain unshaven. 

So far Mary had regarded her lover, Cyprian Aldham, 
from the negative rather than the positive standpoint. 
Had thought less of the positive consequences of her 
engagement to him, his claims upon her, than of certain 
not inconceivable developments, from which she believed 
that engagement would deliver her. But in their late 
conversation Aldham had ranged the positive consequences 
very clearly before her. Not what his relation to her 
enabled her to avoid, but what it made incumbent upon 
her to undertake — the thought of obligations rather than 
safeguards — these began to impress Mary Crookenden. 
And to fulfil those obligations conscientiously, it appeared 
to her she was called upon to make a very clean sweep of 
some interesting episodes of the past. 

And so, about half way across the pleasant open hill- 
side, the great network of wooded valleys lying below, 
carrying the little silver coffin, or shrine — which was it ? — 
Mary left the grass path, and went up over the heather to 
the edge of the cliff. There she sat down, on a mossy spot 
amid the heath, threw aside her hat, and paused, watching. 

Along the extreme verge, just here, grow some leggy 
tufted furzes ; their stems for ever shaken by the 
draught sucking up the cliff face from the beach, nearly 
three . hundred feet beow. Their rounded heads are 
dipt as close by the wind as by any pruning-hook, still 
they flower. They were now packed thick and close, a 
blaze of rich yellow blossom scenting the air with that 
luscious yet cleanly sweetness which seems compact of 
summer and sunshine and fruitful warmth. Mary sitting 
there saw, framed and crossed by their pale, polished, 
many-eyed stems and masses of bloom, the vast plain of 
water — translucent green here in shore, growing bluer, 
more opaque and solid for every added hundred yards of 
distance. The mist had risen, and immediately opposite 
Tabery Point and the land on the far side of the bay lay 
along the horizon, in shape like a huge lilac crocodile, out- 
stretched head and wavy knotted crest, floating asleep upon 
the confines of that turquoise sea. Rounding the point, a 
mere black dot amid the blueness, an outward-bound 

x 2 


308 


The Wages of Sin. 


ocean steamer ; the smoke from its funnel rising in a tall 
upright column, and then, caught by some stronger cur- 
rent in the upper air, trailing back and back horizontally 
in long fine wisps across miles of sky. The tinkling 
treble of the streams came faintly from the valleys behind; 
the deeper note of the waves, breaking slowly, singly, 
along the coast reached her in rising and falling cadence 
from the beach beneath ; and, deeper note still, the cease- 
less sullen beat of surf on the far-away bar at the head 
of the bay. The jackdaws still chattered, the cuckoo 
called. 

For a while Mary watched and listened. Here was fit 
place for the performance of funeral rites, calling the 
serene and ample peace of sea and sky to witness that 
they were duly performed — that she, rooting out of her 
heart all thought of any other lover, gave herself wholly, 
without compromise or reservation, to the man whose wife 
she had promised to be. And the intention was unques- 
tionably a right and pure one, under whatever fantastic 
garment of outward ceremony she might elect to clothe it. 
The intention, yes — but the event ? Ah ! the event, dear 
reader, in Mary’s case, as in yours and my own, was 
determined ages ago, written in the stars. Destiny — which 
is but a poetical name for the great chains of inevitable 
cause and effect which link indissolubly the whole course 
of human history — Destiny shapes the event, and so for it 
we are rarely responsible. All, I think, that is asked of 
us is, that our effort be towards the best we know or can 
picture on the narrow lines between the shackling chains 
— the very narrow lines whereon we are granted to show 
what spirit we are of by exercise of free will. 

And so Mary, carrying out her quaint parable in action, 
untied the ribbon binding the silver box and raised the 
lid. Within lay the halves of the broken china monster, 
benignly grinning dog Toh, symbolizing much. She con- 
templated him musingly, and that which he symbolized 
arose and cried to her. The handsome hands that had 
broken him in two, right across his sacred middle ; 
Colthurst’s hour of weakness and misery ; Colthurst’s 
strange passion of what he had himself prayed might 
prove but hopeless love; Colthurst’s genius, the fierce, 


Two Idylls. 


309 


lurid rush and glamour of it; Colthurst’s dominating 
vitality, the current of which had seemed, at moments, to 
flow out from him and pass into her, awakening, inspiring 
her, soliciting, almost compelling her to sail forth, even as 
the outward-bound steamer there, with its far-trailing 
smoke-wreaths was sailing forth into the wonder, and 
freedom, and delight, and swift-sweeping danger of the 
limitless ocean. And, as she thought of all this — her eyes 
fixed on the smoke- wreaths, lengthening and still lengthen- 
ing as the vessel sped further and further from the sleep- 
ing lilac land into the open west — the nostalgia of which 
Colthurst had once spoken to her, that terrible ache of 
home-sickness for the essence of all that earth, all that 
nature, all that art, all that the strong working of man's 
spirit in the throes and languor of love have to give, 
encircled and possessed, and, in a sense, dissolved Mary 
Crookenden. She knew what it is to have the heart 
poured out like water by an agony of longing — longing 
undefinable, yet all-embracing, longing, as it seems, for 
recovery of a good once ours, lost we know not where or 
when, but lost, alas ! lost. And so the girl flung herself 
face downwards in the heather, now in the fulness of her 
womanhood as in her childhood years ago, with an out- 
burst of passionate weeping ; while the sunshine kissed her 
golden head, and the soft breeze whispered around her, 
and the tough-stemmed furzes along the cliff edge, that 
have valiantly braved the tempest of so many winters, 
shuddered with small dry rustlings and tickings of pity, 
as one might suppose, at sight of this tempest of human 
grief. 

There are several stages in a real big cry, as every 
woman knows. Mary passed through them all. First she 
cried from that desperation of indefinable longing. As 
second stage she cried herself very lonely, ill-used, deso- 
late, without a friend in the world; then cried herself 
tired ; cried herself dull and indifferent ; finally cried her- 
self a trifle ashamed, poor child. 

It was in this last stage that she raised herself, kneeling 
in the heath, tied the ribbon round the box again, not 
without a movement of petulant anger towards the benignly 
grinning monster within find all that he symbolized, 


3io 


The Wages of Sin. 


leaned over the cliff-edge, clasping a furze stem for safety’s 
sake in her left hand, and threw Toh and his silver coffin 
over and down. 

The tide was nearly high. Single waves broke lazily, 
creaming up, one by one, in among the purple-gray 
boulders. The silver box, a point of vdiite light, turned 
and spun in the air in falling ; dropped into the smooth 
green back of an in-rolling wave, with a flop just audible 
to the girl watching from the cliff top far above. 

Mary rose immediately to her feet. That w T as done. 
She had cast away all that James Colthurst had been or 
come near being to her. Cast away, too, her artistic 
aspirations, aspirations after independence and emancipa- 
tion. With Bohemia and ail that term may stand to 
cover — its splendid efforts after the ideal, its bitter, even 
sordid experiences of the real, its fiery thoughts, its great 
swelling words, its obvious lapses of taste, its uncertain 
levels in matters social, its reckless extravagance of emo- 
tion, its heroically perpetual, pathetically futile race after 
the fabled pot of gold which stands at the base of that 
lovely, delusive rainbow we call romance — with all this 
she would have nothing more to do. She had buried all 
this in the sea ; bade the blue-green water hide it away 
under sand, and seaweed, and rounded boulders ; wash 
out the very remembrance of it. Henceforward the culti- 
vated well-bred gentleman to whom she had plighted her 
troth, his interests, his occupations, his tastes, his home — 
that fine old place in Midlandshire — society — the thousand 
and one daily duties which wealth and an influential 
position bring along with them — these should fill her time, 
her mind and heart. Mary told herself she had acted 
wisely, rightly, done that which was safest for all parties 
concerned. 

So she wiped her wet eyes, tidied herself up a little, 
brushed fragments of moss and twig off her gown, pinned 
on her hat ; glancing as she did so at the wide, bright 
horse-shoe of the bay, at the buff sand-hills and white 
splash of a lighthouse and the tide-river working its way 
back among the hills, at the long, lilac line of the opposite 
coast, at the thin floating smoke-wreaths still marking the 
track of the steamer. The steamer itself was unseen. It 


Two Idylls. 


3 ” 

had sailed out into the dusky rose of the sunset — reflec- 
tions from which were beginning to tinge all the western 
sea — down over the edge of the world. And Mary was 
glad it had disappeared ; for notwithstanding her convic- 
tion of the wisdom of her conduct, notwithstanding that 
she had just buried all wild desires in the flowing tide, the 
thought of that outward-bound vessel still raised a dan- 
gerous lump in her throat. 

So to avoid all provocation of further outbursts of 
feeling, of regret for Might-have-been — that cruel, haunt- 
ing phantom who, to so many of us, so sadly mars all that 
Is — she set her face homewards, trying hard to think of 
something very much else — tried to think for instance of 
Mrs. Crookenden’s house-party. 

Every one would be arriving just about now. It must be 
very nearly seven o’clock — the hour one always arrives at 
Brattleworthy, leaving Waterloo by the eleven o’clock train. 
Lady Alicia and Violet had come on Wednesday ; but Mr. 
Winterbotham was unable to get away till the end of the week. 
He and Mr.Duckingfield — sometime an Indian Commission- 
er, now member for the Yeomouth Division, a widower, 
supposed not to be unwilling to make another matrimonial 
venture in the solid and amiable form of Adela Crooken- 
den ; — Mrs. Carmichael and her second daughter ; Mr. 
Evershed, a Clerk in the Foreign Office ; and little Freddy 
Hellard, one of Lord Combmartin’s younger sons on leave 
from Sandhurst, were all coming this evening in company 
with Lancelot. Tiresome people ! Mary wished them 
anywhere. It was so disagreeable to face them all now 
just in the first blush of her engagement. People are so 
stupid and curious when you’re just engaged. They have 
a way of staring at you to see where the change comes in. 
However, to-morrow she had promised Cyprian to go 
over to Beera, and spend Easter Sunday with him. It 
would be rather nice, at all events as enabling her to escape 
curious eyes. On Monday she must encounter them all, 
for the Rector had promised to dine at Slerracombe House. 
And when would she see Lancelot ? Mary felt a wee bit 
aggrieved by Lancelot. She had written him really the 
very nicest of notes announcing her engagement ; telling 
him it would never make any difference, that he always 


312 


The Wages of Sin. 


would be, as he always had been, the very dearest of 
cousins — and he had not answered it. It was vexatious of 
him not to have written. Having heard from him and got 
that over would have made meeting him much easier, 
much less awkward. 

Mary’s thoughts lingered round Lancelot, as she went 
slowly down over the sunny heath, white scuts twinkling 
away to right and left, as the rabbits — out for their supper 
and evening game of play — scurried off into their burrows. 
She was tired — tired with helping to decorate Brattle- 
worthy Church all the morning for to-morrow’s festival in 
company with the two Crookenden girls and the rather 
irrepressible Violet — tired by her interview with Cyprian 
Aldham — tired by her walk — tired by her big cry. And this 
sense of exhaustion, combined with thoughts of Lancelot 
and the sight of the scurrying rabbits, not unnaturally 
caused her mind to revert to a certain other big cry in 
which both her cousin and rabbits had played a part. She 
paused a few yards short of the grass path. 

How funny, it must all have taken place almost exactly 
here ! At sunset, too, when the shadows were long, 
slanting, as her own shadow slanted now, right across the 
hillside to the clump of wind-dipt oaks on the left. There 
were people singing, she remembered ; men from Beera 
Mills and young girls. And then there was the couple 
who followed them — the painter whom Lance had prevented 
her speaking to. Lance had always held the same views 
on that point, had always looked askance at her artistic 
proclivities. Well, he might be easy on that score now, 
anyhow, for her artistic proclivities had gone into the sea 
in dog Toh’s silver coffin. 

Mary sighed ; the lump rose again in her throat. 

She must think of something else. 

The artist had a young woman with him who had spoken 
of her, Mary’s, 1 black nurse.’ In reply he had said (how 
oddly it all came back to her !) { black nurse ? That’s most 
suitably picturesque.' — He had on a check shooting jacket. 

Really it was very strange that she should remember 
the little episode so distinctly! — Mary was quite amused 
at the precision of her own vision as she reconstructed the 
scene bit by bit. 


Two Idylls . 


313 


Lance had called him a cad, and — and in speaking he 
stammered. 

Mary gave a cry as her thought passed, in an instant, 
from idle musing to amazed comprehension. — The young 
woman had worn a grey gown. She was the woman of 
Colthurst’s 1 Road to Ruin.' The woman of the famous 
laughing, fearing, fateful, desperate face, whom all London 
had crowded to see. And the painter — her companion, the 
man to whom she beckoned, as he leaned, weary yet strong, 
fierce even, upon the broken rotting gate — was James 
Colthurst himself. 

A sort of panic seized Mary Crookenden. The sea had 
given up its dead with treacherous promptitude. Refused 
burial to that which she so earnestly desired to bury. 
Sent it back to confront her, to perplex her, to put hard 
questions to her uncommonly difficult of solution. 

Had Colthurst known all along, or was he as innocent of 
a former meeting as she herself had been ? She recalled 
her childish sensations. Repulsion and then attraction; 
and how often these sensations had repeated themselves in 
the last few months. — She had run after him along this 
very grass path, eager to speak to him. Did he remember 
that ? Mary’s panic had a superstitious touch in it. For 
it seemed to her there was something abnormal and 
portentous in the sudden recrudescence of this whole 
matter of Colthurst just when she had made so determined 
and honest an effort to put it from her; in the discovery that 
their acquaintance was of so much older date than she 
had supposed. That discovery agitated her, made her 
nervous, scared her. 

And then the woman of the ‘Road to Ruin’ — the 
beckoning, grey-eyed, tragically-laughing woman, the 
woman whom here, years ago, she had actually seen in the 
flesh— what of her? Was she dead or living? And,ifliving, 
in what relation did she stand to James Colthurst now ? 

For a moment a spirit of jealousy, sharp-toothed 
and keen, invaded Mary Crookenden. But it was only for 
a moment. The girl’s pride, and the innate rectitude of 
which we have already spoken, rose in arms against the 
invader, refusing it lodging and entertainment, sternly 
drove it out. Which was more noble than wise on the 


3 14 


The Wages of Sin. 


part of Miss Crookenden. For when nature speaks, even 
by the voice of a base unlovely passion, it is best carefully 
to weigh what she says. Her little remarks are very 
pregnant, and a summary silencing of them frequently ends 
by landing both yourself and others in an uncommonly 
tight place. 

The Easter moon, large, semi-transparent, irresolute- 
looking, was just clearing the tops of the trees in the 
rectory plantation as Mary let the front gate swing to 
behind her and came up the oval carriage-sweep towards 
the house. Kent Crookenden stood on the steps of the 
porch, his feet a little apart, his thumbs stuck in the arm- 
holes of his waistcoat. 

The Rector had filled out somewhat, otherwise his 
appearance had changed but little during the lapse of the 
last ten years. The hot fit of the fever of life, the fit 
which tells on looks, tells on the general constitution both 
mental and physical, had been got over early in his case, and 
his appearance had become stationary, like his thoughts, 
his purposes, his desires. The steady kindness of his eyes 
still corrected the caustic, half-contemptuous set of his 
thin-lipped mouth and heavy jaw. But now, as he stood 
watching the tall, white figure of the young girl coming 
languidly towards him across the heart-shaped grass-plot 
between the dusky rose of the dying sunset and growing 
silver of that large irresolute moon, there was no trace 
of mockery in the expression of his strongly-marked 
face, rather a tenderness trenching on compassion, on 
regret. 

* Well, Miss Polly/ he said, as Mary came within speak- 
ing distance, 1 1 had nearly given you up for lost. Looked 
everywhere for you here at home, and then went down to 
the House, where I fell into the hands of all manner of 
newly-arrived Philistines, male and female, whom your 
Aunt Caroline has collected to celebrate this church 
festival with her ; but no one could tell me of your 
whereabouts. What have you been doing with yourself, 
eh, young lady ? f 

1 1 have been away in the deer-park seeing — seeing little 
ghosts, Uncle Kent/ Mary answered, smiling. 

1 Then you have been engaged in a most unprofitable 


business — a business with which young people of your age 
should have nothing to do.’ 

4 We live pretty fast now/ she said, looking up and still 
smiling. 4 We go into business pretty early now, even into 
the unprofitable business of ghost-seeing.’ 

The Rector came down the steps and stood beside the 
girl on the grey gravel of the carriage-sweep. His under 
jaw protruded rather ominously, and he questioned her 
upturned face shrewdly with his steady, kindly eyes. 

4 Polly, Polly, you have been crying. I can’t have you 
cry, my dear, unless there is very good cause for it ; and 
then you must tell me, and I will do my best to remove the 
cause.’ 

Mary shook her head, and laughed a little. 

4 1 have only been crying for the ghosts, she said. 
4 And you can’t remove them, Uncle Kent, they are too 
intangible. They would slip through your fingers. They 
do through mine. And they don’t really matter,’ she 
added, 4 not a bit. It is idiotic to fuss about them. 
Things in general are very good to me. I have all I could 
ask just now; all, and a great deal more, than I deserve. 
And so I must needs go and cry for nothing. For the 
ghosts are ghosts of nothing, Uncle Kent, of unrealities, 
of what never has been, never could be.’ 

Mary shook her head, with a charming air of repudiation. 

4 1 wouldn’t have them, Uncle Kent,’ she said ; 4 no, not 
at any price. But I tell you what I will have if you’ll let 
me — that’s the carriage to go over to Beera in time for 
morning service to-morrow. I don’t care very much 
about braving Aunt Caroline’s crowd and seeing each 
member of it casting about for an appropriate congratula- 
tory speech with which to greet me. Cyprian asked me 
to go, and I should be glad to go — very glad, if you didn’t 
mind my taking out one of the horses on Sunday.’ 

The Rector’s eyes still rested questioningly upon her. 

4 Is Aldham priest enough to lay the ghosts, Polly ? ’ he 
asked. 

4 Yes, I think so. I feel pretty sure he is,’ she answered, 
sweetly, gravely. 

4 Then you are welcome to take every horse in the stable 
out on Sunday, my dear/ 


The Wages of Sin . 


3i6 


Chapter VI. 

Dinner was over, and the gentlemen had come out of the 
dining-room. The company had sorted itself — rather to 
Lancelot’s relief — broken up into groups, settled down 
for the evening. Lillie Carmichael was going to sing ; 
Evershed was turning over her music, choosing a song for 
her. And, as he stood by Lady Alicia Winterbotham's 
chair drawn up near the piano, Lancelot took a survey of 
the rest of his guests. Really he believed every one 
was very tidily disposed of; only it was a nuisance Freddy 
Hellard made such an awful noise playing ‘ Pounce ’ with 
Miss Winterbotham. Lancelot looked at the boy and 
wondered if he ought not to go and tell him to be quiet. 
The Rector, Mr. Winterbotham, and Duckingfield with 
Adela for partner, were well into their first rubber of 
whist. Adela played a good, dependable game. Lancelot 
was glad of that, for the three men were first-rate. And 
it struck him that Adela really looked uncommonly well 
to-night. — The same thought had occurred to the member 
for Yeomouth. And as the latter gentleman witnessed the 
girl’s careful judicious play, and saw the set of her fine 
bust and shapely shoulders above the fan of cards held in 
her left hand, he arrived at a definite conclusion regard- 
ing the state of his affections. 

‘Yes, I really am very much pleased at my niece’s en- 
gagement. We all feel the marriage is such a suitable 
one in every respect. The announcement of it has given 
general satisfaction. We all feel Mary is extremely 
fortunate, for Mr. Aldham is so thoroughly nice — so very 
superior and charming, you know. And he is extremely 
well-connected. His mother was one of the North- 
amptonshire Delanys. I should have liked you to meet 
him; but he is not going out just now — poor Lady 
Aldham’s death — you knew her?’ 

This from the sofa, just behind Lancelot, in his mother’s 
placid well-bred tones, accompanied by a rattle of the 
diamond and enamel lockets as the crochet-needle went 
in and out of the soft white wool. 


Two Idylls. 


3i; 


‘ Dash it all, Miss Winterbotham, but you know you 
do cheat like the very — no — no — hold on, look here, it 
was an eight. It’s all right — I swear it was an eight — on 
a nine. There’s the ten — hold on, I say this is real jam,’ 
and the irrepressible Freddy Hellard thump, thumped the 
cards down on the table with a splendid disregard of 
every one’s ears, nerves, and occupations. 

1 1 am always very pleased to hear of a girl who has 
been so popular and so much admired as Mary Crooken- 
den making a nice marriage in the end,’ Mrs. Carmichael 
said, in response to her hostess’s remarks. 

The rattling of the lockets ceased momentarily. — ‘ 1 
suppose my niece really has been a good deal admired ? ’ 

‘Unquestionably,’ Mrs. Carmichael replied, with the 
pretty lingering emphasis of her slight Scotch accent. 

‘ Watch it a bit — why, you know you do scratch like 
anything, Miss Winterbotham ; and — five — I’ll be shot if it 
wasn’t a five — and that ain’t fair, you see, because — ace, 
two — oh! confound — no, I see, all right — because you 
know I can't scratch back.’ 

‘ Her mother was a good deal admired by some people,’ 
Mrs. Crookenden admitted. ‘ I can’t pretend I ever 
perceived her great claim to beauty myself, but Mary is 
extraordinarily like her.’ 

‘ Who was she ? ’ 

‘ Oh ! an American,’ Mrs. Crookenden said, much as 
she might have said an anthropoid ape. 

The Slerracombe drawing-room is a big room. Big 
enough, even when well-lighted as to-night, still to keep 
corners and spaces of warm shadow through which the 
backs of the books in their tall cases show as a pleasant 
well-toned background to the handsome heavy furniture, 
the plants, screens, tall vases of cut flowers, and to the 
pretty women, arrayed with that expensiveness and rather 
lavish revelation of personal charms which characterizes 
English evening dress. And it was about one of these 
shadowed corners that Lancelot’s eyes lingered while his 
mother thus complacently discussed and disposed of the 
question of Mary Crookenden’s engagement. 

He had had no opporti»nity of seeing anything of Polly 
as yet. The duties of hospitality had kept him busy; 


and both yesterday and to-day she had been over at 
Beera. At dinner she sat at his mother’s end of the table. 
Lancelot knew he must speak to her — longed to speak to 
her — about that same matter of her engagement. Yet 
dreaded doing so. The goodly youth feared he should 
make a muddle, and end by saying things best left unsaid. 
But there she was sitting on the other side of the room 
alone with Carrie. Perhaps it would be wisest to go and 
get it over. Every one was provided for. Lady Alicia 
was talking to Evershed. 

But just as Lancelot set forth, Mrs. Carmichael stopped 
him with a question. He answered it. Set forth again 
only to encounter Violet all dimpling smiles, in a pink 
china silk and mousseline de chiffon frock which set off her 
downy ripeness to perfection. 

‘ Oh ! how quite too delightful for words/ she cried. 

‘ You’re coming to play “ Pounce,” Mr. Crookenden ? ’ 

Lancelot shook his head. ‘ No, indeed I’m not/ he 
said, good-temperedly. 

‘ Oh, but indeed you are. I know you are. Move, 
Mr. Hellard. Make room for your cousin. Three-handed 
“ Pounce” is quite the most thrilling game in the whole 
world/ 

‘ Yes, come along and play, old chappie/ put in the lively 
Freddy. ‘You don’t look quite fit somehow to-night, and 
this festive little gamble as conducted by Miss Winter- 
botham would brighten you up, dear boy. ’Pon my 
honour it would. Just hold on and try.’ 

But Lancelot evinced no relish for such brightening up ; 
he advanced resolutely upon the shadowy corner, a sort 
of sinking within him as though he were advancing upon 
an enemy’s battery, the guns of which might open on him 
at any moment. And so they did open ; but it was his 
sister Carrie, not Mary, who applied the portfire. 

‘ Oh ! Lance, do come and see Polly’s engagement 
ring/ she exclaimed by way of greeting, holding up her 
cousin’s hand for inspection. 

For though Carrie Crookenden was a good girl, kind- 
hearted and estimable, she did not possess the gift of 
tact. Indeed if an unfortunate* subject was within a 
conversational mile of her you might be assured she 


Two Idylls. 


3*9 


would light upon it with disastrous certainty and des- 
patch. She was a born blunderer. The blunderer, as a 
rule, while inflicting much misery upon others escapes 
with a whole skin himself. But it was not so with Carrie 
Crookenden. For later, at some moment useless alike 
for avoidance or reparation — usually just as she was 
getting into bed — she would see what she had done, see 
it with horrid clearness. Then would lie awake half the 
night, hot and wretched, in a fever of worry ; only to 
come down to breakfast next morning, the embodiment of 
solid, buxom, physical well-being, and fall into a precisely 
parallel error of speech and perception before she had 
finished her first cup of cream and hot water. For 
Carrie always drank cream and hot water. Once she 
had had an attack of heartburn, which so astonished and 
agitated her that from that celebrated day forward she 
refused ever to touch tea. But there is a species of heart- 
burn, alas 1 from which even the most rigorous diet of 
cream and hot water will not save even the slowest-witted, 
kindest-hearted, most humble-minded and healthy of 
maidens ; and from an acute attack of that species, Carrie 
was suffering to-night. Nobody knew anything about it, 
but Carrie herself. Cyprian Aldham had long appeared to 
her as a sacred being. She worshipped him — from afar ; 
would have been almost shocked indeed, had he descended 
from the remote, celestial region in which she supposed 
him to dwell, and taken any particular notice of her. 
She was not therefore jealous of her cousin. She ac- 
knowledged Mary’s superiority to herself in looks, in 
intelligence in most matters. But the thought of Mary’s 
engagement to the god of her idolatry excited and dazzled 
what of imagination she had. She looked at her cousin 
with a touch of awe. Her position and prospects were 
glorious, unique. And so, lost in wonder, poor Carrie 
blundered with more than her habitual success to-night ; 
saying to Lancelot — 

'Do come and see Polly’s engagement ring. Mr. 
Aldham gave it her to-day. And there’s an inscription 
inside it in Greek, about never parting, you know, never, 
for ever and ever. The words come round, don’t they, 
Polly, whichever way you read then^ I think that’s so 


320 


The Wages of Sin. 


beautiful, I like it so much, don’t you, Lance ? May I 
take it off to show him the inscription ? ’ 

Mary was leaning back in the corner of the sofa. Her 
eyes were half closed. She drew away her hand gently. 

1 No, you mayn’t take it off to show Lance or any one. 
It must stay where it is, Carrie.’ 

* For ever and ever ? ’ the girl inquired, with a kind of 
veiled enthusiasm. 

1 Oh ! yes, I suppose so,’ Miss Crookenden said. 

Lancelot sat down on the arm of the sofa, just behind 
his sister ; and his sister was exceedingly fond of him in 
her own quiet, undemonstrative fashion. She derived a 
great deal of pleasure from his proximity now. It tended 
to comfort her ; though Carrie in her humble simplicity 
hardly owned she stood in need of comfort. On she 
blundered. 

* For ever and ever — that’s so beautiful. I should care 

for it more than all the pearls outside, though they are so 
lovely, if 1 were Polly ’ — but here the speaker grew hot, 
fearing she had not been quite delicate, had taken on 
rather. So, to make matters better, she added — ' Wouldn’t 
you, Lance ? ’ — and then hastened to change the subject. 
‘ I was thinking at dinner you’ll have to give Polly away, 
won’t you, Lance ? Of course Uncle Kent will marry her, 
and so you stand next. It ’ 

' Sara Jacobini will give me away. I have settled all 
about that,’ Mary announced, just a trifle quickly. 

'Oh! dear, will she? Isn’t it rather odd to have a 
woman give you away ? I think Lance would be much 
nicer.’ 

Carrie looked reproachfully at her cousin, and rubbed her 
bare shoulder gently against her brother’s coat-sleeve in 
sign of friendliness. She w as hurt for Lance. She did 
not like him to seem left out in the cold like this. 

' It is often done now,’ Mary asserted. ‘ People are 
continually given away by their mothers, and I am sure 
Sara has been more than most mothers to me. It is a very 
reasonable custom.’ 

' Oh ! well, still I think Lance would be much nicest ! * 

Mary could hardly repress a movement of irritation , 
Really Carrie was ingeniously inconvenient, 


Two Idylls. 


321 


But now Miss Carmichael was singing. Her fine mezzo- 
soprano has a natural tremor in it which is decidedly 
moving. She had selected a moving song moreover. 
Gounod’s setting of those three short verses by a modern 
writer in which threefold love — love of lovers, love of nature, 
love of God — finds as pathetic yet as simple and chastened 
expression as in any verses, perhaps, in our English tongue. 

‘ Oh ! that we two were Maying, 

Over the fragrant leas ; 

Like children with young flowers playing 
Down the^ stream of the rich spring breeze.’ 
sang the young voice. And Lancelot, sitting sideways on 
the arm of the sofa, listened with a certain tightening 
about the muscles of his throat. And Carrie listened, not 
venturing in her innate humility to give the words a per- 
sonal application, but thinking how wonderful and sweet 
it must be to be Mary Crookenden, such a ring on her 
finger, and such prospect of sacred companionship ahead. 
While in Mary herself, thanks to the inherent perversity 
of things, the song reproduced some touch of the terrible 
nostalgia she had suffered watching the outward-bound 
steamer two days ago. Her eyebrows drew together, and 
her face grew hard. For she believed that nostalgia to 
be unlawful, a temptation to be resisted and conquered. 

1 Oh ! that we two, oh ! that we two were Maying ’— 
repeated the young voice. 

Is it not, after all, a little too bad to let poetry 
and sentiment loose on one thus, after dinner, in the 
well-ordered drawing-room of a country house ? The 
young people present have poetry and sentiment in 
plenty anyhow, in the mere fact of their youth, sex, 
and good looks or the reverse — for plainness may afford 
basis of poetry as well as beauty — without any out- 
side adventitious assistance. And for the rest of us, why, 
in heaven’s name, galvanize into activity just all that 
which, youth being past, it is so much safer neither to feel 
nor think of since the future will afford it no legitimate 
opportunity of exercise ? By forty, if we are decent, 
reputable persons, the limbs of what I may call the body 
of our affections will be mostly afflicted with paralysis. 
And it is a gratuitous barbarity to awaken convulsive 

Y 


322 


The Wages of Stn. 


semblance of life, convulsive jerkings and tinglings, by 
passing any poetic-emotional electric current through them. 
Better, far let them rest inert and nerveless under whatever 
covering, reason, philosophy, or even dull-souled custom 
may have succeeded in spreading over them. 

So, anyhow, thought Kent Crookenden, at the whist-table, 
when hearing the upsetting words and voice. He lost a trick, 
indeed, in the effort to repress such involuntary jerkings 
and tinglings, while he became curiously conscious of the 
weight of the old miniature which for so many years had 
hung around his neck. Mr. Duckingfield, too, suffered 
disturbance of mind and lost not a trick, but sight of his 
partner's fine bust and amiable countenance above the fan 
of cards held in her hand — seeing, instead, a grave, far 
away, beneath the glare of Indian sunlight ; the grave of 
the girl who, as little more than a boy himself, he had 
loved and won, had watched droop in the fierce heat and 
had laid to rest beneath the sands of the * Land of Re- 
grets.’ Even the harness of officialism, in which Mr. 
Winterbotham's timid hopelessly respectable spirit so long 
had clothed itself, gave a little at the joints. He cleared 
his throat, fingered his cards, peering through the lights 
and shadows of the large room at his wife away there by 
the piano. The music made him uncomfortable, though 
he never had been, had not a notion how to go ‘ a-maying.' 
Possibly Lady Alicia had some notion though, for her 
small mouth set very close. She tried not to remember a 
lad in the Guards who had come to Whitney with her 
brother Shotover the autumn before she married — not to 
remember a certain luncheon out of doors, on the southern 
side of one of the great pheasant coverts, — Lord Denier, 
a former Sir Richard Calmady — the present man's father 
— a lot of gentlemen were there, and — Lady Alicia went 
no further along the path of reminiscence, but arranged 
the pointe de Venise frill on her left sleeve. Perceived a 
little tear in the lace. Really Conyers was not half such a 
good maid as Dashwood had been. It was annoying of 
Dashwood's mother to die, and her father to want to have 
her at home 1 — Mrs. Carmichael had her thoughts too. 
Evershed even had his ; for the voice was so sadly sweet 
that he began to wonder if the singer could be troubled by 


Two Idylls. 


323 


memories, could have ever entertained a fancy for another 
than his highly desirable self? Such an idea was a little 
too obviously absurd however; he rejected it with con- 
temptuous incredulity, telling himself he must really be un- 
commonly far gone if it came to such wonderings as that. 

Only Mrs. Crookenden's crochet needle went back and 
forth unconcernedly through the white wool, while the 
lockets jangled; and Mr. Freddy Hellard’s vernacular 
broke in, discordant, upon the magic of the song. 

1 No, why ? oh ! I say it's too bad to go cavorting 
around with two kings in that way, Miss Winterbotham.’ 
A series of vigorous thumps on the table, an outburst of 
very whole-hearted, boyish laughter. 1 No, you don’t — 
you bet you don’t — not this time, not by a long chalk, 
Miss Winterbotham.’ 

Lancelot rested his hands on his sister’s plump 
shoulders. 

I Look here, Carrie/ he said. * 1 should be no end 
grateful to you if you’d go and stop Freddy making that 
awful row.' 

Carrie was not a person of infinite resource. She wanted 
to please Lancelot, but she also wanted to stay here by him ; 
her heart warmed under that delightful brotherly caress. 

I I don't know how to stop him,’ she said. 

1 Tell him he shall have the monkey he wants if he’s a 
good boy and keeps quiet for the rest of the evening.’ 

1 The monkey — I don’t understand.’ 

* Freddy will, though, fast enough. Stay there a little, 
do, and keep him quiet.’ 

Carrie rose reluctantly from her place. 

* I’ll tell him of course,’ she said. 1 But I am sure he’d 
much rather have a bull-dog, and I don't believe they’ll 
let him keep a monkey at Sandhurst, so I’m afraid it will 
be no good.’ 

‘Oh that we two lay sleeping 
Under the churchyard sod ! 9 

Lancelot slipped off the arm of the sofa into the place 
just vacated by his sister. He did not wait to hear the 
end of the verse, fearing the grip on the muscles of his 
throat might grow a trifle too tight for coherent speech if 

v 3 


3 2 4 


The Wages of Sin . 


he did. He crossed his legs. Clasped his hands round 
one knee. Stared fixedly at the crinkles of an orange and 
black silk sock around his ankle. 

i It’s quite true then, Polly/ he said. 1 You and Aldham 
have made it up ? ’ 

Now between the emotional effect of the song, Carrie’s 
blunders, and another feeling, the result of two days spent 
almost exclusively in Mr. Aldham’s company — a feeling 
which she was anxious not very carefully to analyse — 
Mary was slightly on edge. It is a fallacy to suppose 
that suffering breeds sympathy. Very frequently it breeds 
something of a diametrically opposite kind. A sense of 
your own ache makes your neighbour’s ache appear a 
trivial affair, an irritating affair, almost an impertinence 
and intrusion. 

' Yes, I wrote and told you so last week.’ Mary paused, 
moved her foot, altering the folds of her skirt. 1 1 think 
you might have taken the trouble to answer my letter, 
Lance,' she said. 

1 I’m not a great letter-writer, you know,’ he replied in 
the same constrained tone. * I’m sorry if it was rude of 
me not to write. But I thought you’d excuse it as we 
should meet soon, Polly.’ 

A repressed sputter of laughter from Freddy Hellard, 
Carrie with largely perplexed countenance, bending over 
him trying to fathom the joke of her own just repeated 
doubts as to the rights of pet-keeping likely to be recog- 
nized by the military authorities at Sandhurst. And Miss 
Carmichael's voice, rising into passion in the last words of 
her song : — 

* And our souls at home with God — at home with God.’ 

Then a hush through the room, a hush more compli- 
mentary far than applause, followed by Mr. Winterbotham 
clearing his throat with an effect of relief and saying in 
his civil, mechanical voice ' May I trouble you to cut, 
Mr. Duckingfield ? — my deal, I believe.’ Then general 
conversation, by general tacit agreement I suppose not to 
let sentiment invade too freely, penetrate too deep. 

Mary Crookenden, under cover of that rising hum of 
talk, scrutinized the young man nursing his knee, staring 


Two Idylls. 


325 



at his black and yellow silk sock. Like many other per- 
sons she was slow to learn to accept the consequences of 
her own actions. Lancelot was constrained with her ; his 
constraint was natural enough under the circumstances, 
was, indeed, calculated to save trouble. Mary had much 
better have submitted to it. But she could not make up 
her mind to submit. She placed her hand on the seat of 
the sofa, leaned towards him. 

‘ Lance, dear old boy, haven’t you anything more to say 
to me than that ? ’ she asked rather plaintively. ‘ Say 
something nice to me. I ran’t bear to be at sixes and sevens 
with you. Give me your blessing.' — Mary laughed a 
little nervously. — ‘ And tell me, Lance, tell me you don’t 
mind much.' 

‘ 1 don’t see the use of telling lies, exactly — ’ and there 
Lance stopped. 

‘ Oh ! no, of course not ! But promise you won’t 
detest me for — for it.’ 

‘ Don’t talk rot, Polly/ he said almost roughty. 

That song had made him feel ‘awfully badly/ He 
wished he had stayed over by Lady Alicia. 

For a moment Mary debated whether it would not be 
justifiable and convenient to be angry, intimate he had 
mislaid his manners, sail away loftily across the room. 
But she was not particularly happy, and it occurred to her 
happiness was hardly likely to be increased by quarrelling 
with so old a friend as Lancelot. She became explanatory. 

‘ Indeed it is best for all of us,' she said. ‘ I can’t go 
into the ins and outs with you, that is impossible. But, 
Lance, if I could, if you knew the whole business from 
beginning to end, I am sure you would see I have done 
what was wisest, what was right. I was getting into 
muddles — ’ Mary hesitated. ‘You must take my word 
for it, Lance, it is best as it is. And so you must try — 
you will, won’t you ?— not to mind. Promise to tr}' to 
forget — and get over it. I shall be miserable if I think 
you are fretting. Indeed it isn’t worth fretting about. 
Promise to try to get over it, there’s a dear, Lance.’ 

‘ Oh ! I can’t promise that.’ 

Lancelot set his teeth, told himself not to be a sel- 
fish fool, saw that Lillie Carmichael was making room 


326 


The Wages of Sin . 


for Carrie at the piano — there would be no more songs, 
then, he was glad of that. Carrie had lessons every year 
when the family went up to London. She was working 
her way through Beethoven ; each year she added, with 
much conscientious labour a sonata or two to her re- 
pertoire. She plunged now into the last learned. Her 
playing was ponderously correct, grandly dull. Mean- 
while emotion picked up her trailing skirts and fled. 
Carrie had a fine power of depriving a composer of all 
pathetic and agitating qualities. Therefore Lancelot found 
assistance in his sister’s performance at this juncture. 

4 But you know you mustn't bother about me, Polly/ he 
said presently. 4 This is just one of the chances of war. 
People can’t make themselves not care when they do care, 
any more than they can make themselves care when they 
don’t. All that takes you from the outside, if you know 
what I mean. You can't avoid it; but it doesn't matter.’ 

He unclasped his knee, leaned back in the far corner of 
the sofa, and smiled at his cousin, the tender, sweet- 
tempered, half amused expression back in his pleasant face. 

4 1 beg your pardon, Polly, I ought to have answered 
your letter ; for it was awfully good of you to write like 
that, at once, yourself. And Aldham’s a splendid fellow ’ 
— again Lancelot stopped, the amusement waned some- 
what, but he did not lower his eyes. — 4 He’s loads of brains. 
He'll be able to give you what you want. I am awfully 
glad you are going to — to marry a man I admire as much 
as I do him.’ 

The goodly youth congratulated himself. It seemed to 
him he was pulling through very fairly well after all. 

4 1 was half afraid you’d got rather into muddles,’ he went 
on. 4 1 felt that somehow.’ 

Lancelot crossed his legs again, held his right ankle in 
his left hand, presenting his cousin with a fine view of a 
pointed-toed shoe sole. 

4 And, don't be vexed, Polly, but I couldn’t help fancying 
that beastly old drawing-school went for something in the 
muddles.’ 

Mary raised herself from her pretty, pleading, explana- 
tory position, and leaned back in her corner of the sofa. 

4 Of course it was awfully stupid, but to tell you the 


Two Idylls. 


327 

truth, I’d got into a horrid fright about that fellow Colt- 
hurst. I didn’t a bit like your getting so mixed up with 
him. I’m tremendously glad, all round, you’re out of all that.’ 

Miss Crookenden made an effort to hold her tongue. 
But the effort was unsuccessful. 

' It is too bad,’ she said, ' the way all my friends, you and 
Sara, every one, make such a dead set at Mr. Colthurst.’ 

'Well, he is a bit of a bounder, you know, Polly, 
Lancelot replied, in tones of gentle argument. ' I heard 
rather a queer story about him in a roundabout way when 
we were home here at Christmas.’ 

'What have you heard?’ Mary demanded — and then 
she could have beaten herself for the eagerness of her 
own voice, the eagerness of her desire to know. 

' Oh ! well, it was a low sort of story — not the sort of 
story one cares to repeat unless there’s some particular 
reason for repeating it. If I had seen Madame Jacobini 
alone that day — the day — you know — we drove together’ 
— again Lancelot stopped. ' I meant to have spoken to 
her about it. But as you’re quit of the man and his 
school there’s no object in repeating it. I don’t see the 
fun of turning over a muck heap unless one’s obliged to. 
And the man’s affairs are no earthly business of mine, now 
as I say you’re quit of him.’ 

This time Miss Crookenden did succeed in holding her 
tongue. A silence, therefore, between the two cousins, 
Carrie pounding away, meanwhile, charging a rondo 
marked capricioso in the style of a squadron of ‘ heavy 
dragoons. Suddenly Lancelot asked ' There aren't 
two painters of the name of Colthurst, are there, Polly ? ’ 

' Not that I am aware of.’ 

'Ah ! exactly. He is the one then. I didn’t want to 
do the man an injustice.’ 

' I say, Lance, all fair and square, bond fide offer, no de- 
ception?’ and Freddy Hellard perched on the end of the sofa. 

' If you keep quiet,’ Lancelot said. 

' My dear fellow, I am keeping quiet all I know how — 
have been all this blessed evening. It was Miss Winter- 
botham made the row, not me. ’Pon my honour it was. 
Miss Crookenden, tell him it was — you believe me, don’t 
you ? 1 


328 


The IVages of Sin. 


Mary smiled an answer. She was not thinking about 
Master Freddy. She was putting two and two together, 
as the saying is; trying to make them five, fearing that in 
point of fact they make four. But Freddy was unaware 
of this. He was usually shy at Miss Crookenden. Her 
smile mitigated his timidity. He was also extremely 
jubilant at the prospect of paying his debts, without 
having recourse to an angry father. He became confi- 
dential. 

‘ Between ourselves Miss Winterbotham’s frightfully 
volatile. She is a gay goer, is Miss Winterbotham. 
You bet, she can make things hum, that girl can. I have 
been casting an affectionate prophetic eye, Miss Crooken- 
den, over this dear old chappie’s future, w T hen he runs in 
double harness with her and — holy blazes, Lance, what 
are you up to ? ' 

For Lancelot had caught hold of the boy, whipped him 
off the end of the sofa, laid him face downwards across 
his knees, gently but resistlessly pinioned his arms at his 
sides. 

i Don’t be an ass, Freddy,’ he said. 

1 But it’s perfectly true, Cousin Caroline’s been telling 
— let me up — ask him to let me up, Miss Crookenden; I 
shall have a fit in half a minute — telling my respected 
parents and all the family — ugh — about the double harness 
for the ’ 

Lancelot bumped the boy's elbows together behind his 
back. 

1 Be quiet, Freddy,’ he said. 

' But —oh! I say — how can I be quiet when you get 
bear-fighting like this ? It’s a beastly shame. He wants 
to cut me out of those few dollars, Miss Crookenden. 
But I’m not covetous. I’ll speak the truth at the risk of 
— stop him, stop him, he’s murdering me. — She was just 
mad, Miss Crookenden, when he wouldn’t come and play 
“ Pounce.” Her eyes snapped like — ugh — confound it, 
you are strong, old chap.’ 

The whist players finished their rubber. A movement 
at the table, discussion of obscure points of play, counting 
of gains and losses — then the Rector came over to the 
sofa. * Are you ready to go, Polly ? ' he asked. 


Two Idylls. 


329 


Mary was more than ready. The evening had not 
been an altogether successful one. She made her adieux 
to the company. The Rector and Lancelot followed her 
into the hall. The distance from the house to the rectory 
is quite short, and as the night was fine Mary and her 
uncle proposed walking home. This necessitated a 
certain amount of wrapping up. Lancelot helped his 
cousin into the sea-green cache-nnsere , with which the 
reader is already acquainted, gave her the white lace scarf * 
for her head, hunted under the billiard table, which stands 
in the centre of the hall, for the pair of overshoes to protect 
her feet. — They had been kicked some way underneath 
the table, and Lancelot had to go on all fours to find 
them. But when found, he did not offer to put them on 
for her, he let her do that herself; for notwithstanding 
his solicitude for her comfort, there was an element of 
reserve in Lancelot’s helpfulness to-night when it came to 
close quarters. And she barely thanked him. She was 
still trying to assure herself two and two may make five, 
still seeing four stand uncompromisingly at the foot of the 
column. The Rector stood buttoning his overcoat, talk- 
ing to Lancelot ; but Mary paid little heed to their con- 
versation. That story about Colthurst— she wanted to 
hear it, wanted not to hear it; wanted, above all, not to 
want to hear it. What was Colthurst to her, or she to 
Colthurst ? As Lancelot said she was quit of the man, 
his affairs were no concern of hers ; it was foolish, treason- 
able to think of him, and yet — yet — 

1 I’m going up to town with this young lady to-morrow: 
very likely I may not be back before you leave. But if 
you think of anything more, estate business, and so forth, 
we ought to talk over, send me a line and I will meet you 
at Plymouth on my way back. You have quite decided to 
sail from there, rather than from Tilbury, have you not ? ' 

*- Yes, I think so. You see, it’ll give me another day 
with my mother ; and I’m afraid it will be rather a — well, 
a shock to her any way. And Ludovic Quayle joins the 
boat at Plymouth, I find.’ 

Mary looked up from her galosh. It was so tiresome 
to put on. The muslin and lace frilling in the hem of her 
dress would get into the heel of it. 


1 Sail ? Where are you and Mr. Quayle going, Lance ? ’ 
she asked, quickly. 

1 Oh, well to Bombay first of all, I suppose. I’ve rather 
a fancy for Kashmir and Thibet/ the young man answered 
simply and cheerily. ' I should like to have a shot or 
two at those jolly big sheep — oves ammon , don’t you know, 
Polly, with the thundering great horns — before the Indian 
sportsmen have cleared them all out. And there are 
some pretty tidy mountains out there with unpronounce- 
able names I should rather like to have a try at/ 

Mary let her galosh be, ceased attempting to make two 
and two into five. The expression of her fair face was 
startled, humbled, looking out from those swathings of 
white lace. 

' I shall have an awfully interesting time, I expect/ 
Lancelot added. 

( But, oh Lance, why are you going ? ’ 

The Rector had moved towards the door) which the 
footman held open. 

Tome along, come along, Miss Polly/ he said. ' Have 
a little consideration for a stingy man who has lost 
money at cards, and wants to get home to the consolations 
of his books and his pipe/ 

' Shall you be away long, Lance ? ’ 

* Oh, well, that depends. For as long as Uncle Kent’s 
willing to take over all my business for me. He’s aw- 
fully good to me, you know, Polly. A year or two, I 
daresay.’ 

The Rector wished history would not repeat itself. — 
* Not that I had the lad’s good looks any more than I had 
his fortune to offer Mary Coudert/ he thought. — The 
little miniature seemed to drag at the black ribbon round 
his neck. He went on down the steps. — ‘ Lancelot takes 
his misfortune very well/ he said to himself . — * He will 
not let it break him as — ’ the Rector sighed a little as he 
stepped out into the broad silver of the moonlight — ' as I 
let the same misfortune break me. — Polly/ he called 
rather huskily, ' Polly, come along, my dear.’ 

Mary ran down the steps after him, accompanied by 
rich rustle of voluminous skirts ; and, Cinderella-like, 
dropped her slipper — that same but half-adjusted galosh 


Two Idylls . 


33 


— in her flight. And the young prince, as in the dear 
old story, saw it, picked it up, forestalling the action of 
the footman, and strode after her. 

1 Here, I say, Polly,’ he cried. 1 Stop half a minute. 
You must put this on. It’s not safe for you to walk 
home in those thin shoes.’ 

And he knelt down on the loose, shingly gravel of the 
carriage drive in front of her. 

‘ There, hold up,’ he said cheerily. 

Mary could not find anything to say to him just then, 
somehow. But she held out her foot — heard the sleepy 
grunt of a buck from inside the railings of the deer-park, 
the trample of the surf on the bar, the sound of Kent 
Crookenden's receding footsteps. Turned to see if he 
had gone far, nearly lost her balance in so doing, stand- 
ing crane-like on one leg. Stretched out her hand to 
save herself, found it light on the nearest object capable 
of affording support — the top of Lancelot’s round black 
head. 

Men, even the better bred among them, in their relation 
to women are divisible into two classes — those , who take 
advantage of such small accidents, slips, misadventures, 
and those who do not. Lancelot Crookenden belonged to 
the latter class. For just long enough for the girl to 
recover her footing the black head remained still, firm as 
a rock, under her hand. Then the young man sprang up. 

1 Your shoe’s right enough now, Polly,' he said, yet he 
was very sensible of that tight grip on the muscles of 
his throat again. * You mustn’t stand about. The wind 
cuts rather sharp round the corner of the house, though 
it is such a jolly clear night.' 

But Mary had found what to say to him at last. And 
the words came, with a sense of self-abasement, of self- 
reproach. 

i Lance, you are going away because of me. I have 
spoilt your home to you — darling old Lance, you must 
detest me — I have spoilt your life.’ 

1 Oh ! not spoilt it, Polly,’ he said. 

The goodly youth looked very gallant, knightly even, 
notwithstanding the prose of a dress coat and immaculate 
shirt-front, bare-headed there in the clear chill moonlight. 


332 


The Wages of Sin. 


4 Nothing — well, except doing wrong, you know, spoils 
life, I think.' He stopped a minute — 4 And I'd rather 
you married Aldham than anybody, indeed I would. 
Don’t you bother about me. Only, if it wouldn’t be a 
nuisance to you, I should be awfully glad if you would 
put my name in now and then when you say your 
prayers. I — well, I think it would help to keep me 
straight.' 

Lancelot thrust his hands into his pockets, whistled 
even a little as he swung back across the gravel. Away 
at the head of the bay, between the misty purple of 
vaguely-seen sea and hills, the lighthouse shone a steady 
watchful and, as it seemed to the young man, a kindly eye 
of light. 

4 44 Oh ! that we two ” — No, hang the song — ’ 

And he ran up the steps and banged the front door to 
after him. Violet Winterbotham stood rosy, dimpling, 
downiest of dormice, ripest of cherries, in the hall. 

4 Mr. Crookenden, I am simply expiring for a game of 
billiards,’ she said. ‘ Do come and play with me, will 
you ? ’ 

4 Why, of course, if you like.’ 

4 Oh ! how quite too charming for words.’ 

Lancelot turned the balls out of a corner pocket. 

1 1 wonder when I’d better tell my mother,’ he thought. 
4 I’m afraid it’s rather rough on her. I hope she won’t be 
very much put out. — What will you take, Miss Winter- 
botham? Fifteen in fifty — or twenty-five in a hundred,’ 
he said 


Chapter VII. 

The first of May came and went, bringing James Colt- 
hurst’s disciples and admirers assurance that his success 
had been no flash in the pan, but that he was fully equal 
to sustaining the reputation he had made for himself. For 
his work of this year was as strong, as arresting and 
complete, as that of last. In one respect, indeed, the 
new pictures were, in the estimation of many, superior to 
the * Road to Ruin.’ There was less obvious story in 


Two Idylls. 


333 


them, and th^y were not, consequently, open to the charge 
of being painted literature, novels on canvas. 

The larger one, 1 The Chain Harrow/ shows Colthurst’s 
talent under a fresh aspect, reminding one somewhat, in its 
idyllic charm and grace, of Mason. And this without sacri- 
fice of reality. For the lithe, gay-eyed lad hanging on to the 
long rope reins to steady the young horse — all foam and 
fret — which pulls against the old horse as the two drag the 
glistening, jumping links of the great square harrow up 
over the rough pasture, is a real lad enough. He belongs 
to no fine fanciful age, such as that of which a famous 
writer on art so melodiously prophesies, wherein the whirr 
of machinery shall be stilled and the steam be relegated 
to the housewife’s tea-ketile, and toil become a sort of 
pious pastime robbed of fatigue, dirt, and all harsh acces- 
sories ; an age wherein every one shall be content and as 
good as they are pretty. For the sweat stands on his ruddy 
face; and the rope reins only do not cut his hands be- 
cause those hands are much of the texture, as they are 
much of the colour, of brick-bats ; his leathern leggings 
are clogged and sticky with red earth, and the moisture of 
the drifting gleaming mist — mist in which the sunshine 
hangs as in solution, mist closing in the scene on every 
side — drips from the frayed edges of the old sack fastened 
by a greasy tag of boot-lace across his shoulders. The 
young horse is hot and masterful. The old horse tired. 
Neither to them nor to their driver— hardly controlling 
the one and urging the other — is the world all beer and 
skittles ; nor even a world peopled by the charming little 
agriculturists and nicely-behaved beasts and birds of Miss 
Kate Greenaway’s almanacs, or the high-souled devoutly- 
reverent-towards-their-betters peasants of Mr. Ruskin’s 
reconstructed, expurgated edition of the Middle Ages. 
The mysterious curse, which gives life (as we know it) at 
once its terror and its glory, is on the land, on labour, on 
the cattle unwillingly obedient to bit and bridle, on the lad 
himself— for all his young masculine vigour — in Colt- 
hurst’s picture as it has been on all such things from the 
dawn of history ; as it will be on them — philosophies, 
philanthropies, optimistic systems, the English House of 
Commons and all its measures even, notwithstanding — 


334 


The Wages of Sin. 


until the end, when the book of earthly existence is 
written and closed at last, and the story of our race, its 
achievements, its disasters, fully told. 

But though the shrewder members of the general public 
perceived in this picture that which makes all the differ- 
ence between a great work and a common-place one, it was 
Colthurst’s other and rather smaller painting that attracted 
most attention, provoked most comment, before which 
the crowd gathered thickest, wondered most, said least. 

A cloudless evening sky — primrose fading upwards into 
thin crystalline green, and that again into blue — behind 
the downy greyish buds and crimson, white and flesh- 
coloured flowers of a row of tall hollyhocks bordering a 
perspective of narrow garden path. On the right a 
cottage wall — the whitewash of it discoloured, scaling off 
in places, defaced by nail-holes, showing the rusty red of 
the brickwork beneath. And, his back resting against it, 
sitting on a wooden bench, directly facing the spectator — 
his knees a little apart, his head poked forward, his loose- 
lipped mouth slobbering helplessly over the coarse un- 
bleached cloth tied round his neck — a full-grown man, 
whose dull eyes are majestic in the depth of their pent-up 
incommunicable sorrow, tenderly nursing an old broken- 
limbed Dutch doll. 

Colthurst, in moments of expansion, was fond of preach- 
ing to the young men of the Conn op School on the text 
the power is its own best advocate. 

* It is possible so to present things/ he would say, 'that 
even fops and fribbles think twice before they dare raise a 
laugh. It all comes back to a question of strength. If you 
are strong enough you may go naked and no one will inter- 
fere with you. And most certainly, if you are strong enough, 
you may present fact without a rag on, and though people 
will be scared and try to hide their scare under accusations 
of bad taste, and will talk a large amount of long-winded 
rubbish about observing the legitimate limits of your art, 
they will not venture to smile. They may hate you. But 
hate does a man’s reputation very little harm. Snap your 
fingers at hate. That which stings, that which injures, 
because it undermines self-confidence, is ridicule/ 

And unquestionably in the case of the idiot, sitting 


Two Idylls. 


335 


there amor.g the hollyhocks with the peace of the evening 
sky behind him, Colthurst had succeeded in so presenting 
his painful subject that criticism of the superior, contemp- 
tuous, patronising sort found itself grow somewhat silent 
and diffident. The dumb knowledge of degradation, of 
alienation from all sweetness of common fellowship 
written in the creature’s sombre eyes; the instinct of 
love, love denied possibility of natural expression, shown 
in the clinging action of its monkey-like hands about that 
battered wooden idol of a doll, raised the conception to a 
plane of tragedy where, as with the fabled head of Medusa, 
increase of horror becomes, in a sense, only increase of 
beauty. 

It is unnecessary to state that Miss Crookenden heard 
these two pictures freely discussed during the weeks that 
immediately followed her return to London. But it ap- 
peared, somehow, that she was always too busy to go and 
see them. Affairs of the trousseau, letters returning 
thanks for wedding presents became imperative whenever 
Aldham — who spent a good deal of time at his aunt’s in 
Eccleston Square, at this period, much to that pretty old 
lady’s happiness — begged her to visit the Academy with 
him. Miss Crookenden appeared to have lost her taste 
for picture galleries ; new frocks carried it over the arts 
just now. And this slightly vexed her lover. He intended 
his bride to surprise Midlandshire, and her various new 
relations, into admiration by something beyond her per- 
sonal charms and little air of society. He was more than 
willing that delightful and somewhat exclusive county 
should be impressed by his wife's smartness. But he in- 
tended that it should be impressed by her intelligence and 
accomplishments as well. He intended it should fully realise 
that he had married a very clever woman. He thought it 
right to set his intentions clearly before her, therefore, one 
morning when it struck him the frivolous was gaining 
rather reprehensibly over the intellectual. 

1 1 propose that our house shall be a centre of real 
culture/ he said to her, in the course of their conversation. 
*1 should like it to become noted, as certain country 
houses one could mention have been and are noted for the 
brilliancy of their intellectual atmosphere, for the excel- 


336 


The Wages 'of Sm. 


lence of the talk you hear and the character of the society 
you meet at them. Few women are more fitted than 
yourself, Mary, to be mistress of such a house; and 
Aid ham Revel offers you an excellent milieu. To begin 
with, the house is large enough to hold a considerable 
number of guests comfortably. The rooms are good, 
and could be made much more charming at a small 
expenditure of taste on your part. Poor Lady 
Aldham’s views of decoration were slightly prim and 
antiquated. Then the library is a really remarkable one. 
It contains some valuable black-letter books and manu- 
scripts, and a collection of seventeenth and eighteenth 
century memoirs, which is, 1 believe, almost unrivalled.’ 

‘ I am glad of that,' Mary remarked. 

She was occupied in setting out a number of more or 
less costly offerings on a table in the white and apricot- 
coloured drawing-room. 

1 You are fond of memoirs ? ’ Aldham asked. 

^ No, I don’t care for them particularly, but Sara Jacobini 
is devoted to them.’ 

Mr. Aldham was one of those persons who are rarely 
guilty of the weakness of an exclamation. But his lips 
became slightly compressed. It is impossible for two 
people to entertain a latent dislike of each other without 
betraying themselves on many small occasions. Aldham 
had long ago discovered that his fiancee } s companion had 
no special devotion towards him. He very naturally, 
therefore, returned the compliment by being by no means 
particularly attached to her. Madame Jacobini, moreover, 
presented a difficulty. Where was she to come in, in the 
new establishment!? If he could have had his way he 
would have answered concisely — nowhere. But he fore- 
saw that on this point his opinion and that of Miss 
Crookenden were not likely to be entirely at one. He 
therefore deferred the discussion of it to a more convenient 
season, and returned to the list of attractions supplied by 
Aldham Revel. 

‘ The pictures will please you, too,’ he said. * My 
grandfather had a great taste for the English landscape 
school. He made a very creditable collection of Con- 
stables, De Wints, Morlands, and Callcotts. Two of the 


Two Idylls. 


337 


best u old ” Cronies I know hang in the little cedar 
drawing-room. Remind me to show you them when we go 
down next week.' 

'Yes/ assented Mary. 

Aldham remarked that — the visiting of picture galleries 
excepted — she almost invariably did assent. This pleased 
him. It was as it should be. Still he could not help 
noticing a certain listlessness in her tone. To-day he 
had brought her, on behalf of his uncle, the most costly 
offering of all— poor Lady Aldham’s diamonds, which had 
been cleaned and in part reset. They glittered and 
flashed — a couple of necklaces, five stars, some pendants 
and brooches — as they rested on the purple velvet cushions 
of their respective cases, really a royal sort of gift for any 
bride to receive. Aldham glanced from them to their new 
owner. The woman and the jewels suited each other to 
admiration. He was genuinely proud of both. But an 
increasing longing to mould, fashion, in a sense, use the 
beautiful girl stirred in him. For it is incontestable that 
the natural man in us survives much disintegrating action 
of high civilisation ; and a pretty strong dash of the sultan 
remained in this clean-shaven, fine-featured, black-coated 
young priest. It struck him that Miss Crookenden took 
both his conversation, his gifts, and the very pleasant 
position he offered her, a trifle too much for granted — that 
she seemed insufficiently sensible of the excellence of the 
marriage she was about to make. This nettled him slightly. 

‘ Suppose, Mary/ he said suddenly, in that clear deli- 
cately incisive voice of his, ' suppose you leave off arrang- 
ing the presents for a little while, and give your mind 
wholly to our talk. I want to see you interested, genuinely, 
spontaneously interested in the thought of our future life 
together/ 

* I am interested, profoundly interested/ Miss Crooken- 
den answered. She seemed to deliberate for a few sec onds. 
Then she moved away from the table and its display of 
glories, sat down near Cyprian Aldham, smiling at him 
very sweetly. ' Well, go on, plan it all out, give me the 
stage directions, teach me my part/ she said. 

Aldham laughed a little with an irresistible movement 
of satisfaction. 


z 


338 


The Wages of Sin . 


* You are charmingly submissive, Mary. Will this most 
commendable and captivating attitude continue?* 

* That is my desire/ Mary Crookenden said. And she 
said it seriously, looking full at her lover. 

Would it continue ? To Mary that was the most vital 
of questions just now. She had mentioned to Madame 
Jacobini six weeks ago as proof of Mr. Aldham’s high 
eligibility, that he gave her no feelings. But he had 
begun giving her feelings. Notably a feeling that there 
was, to use a hackneyed illustration, a hand of steel within 
the velvet glove of his fine manner. She began to see 
through the covering of soft flesh to the bone, the skeleton 
so to speak of Mr. Aldham’s character. She found nothing 
indefinite, nothing flabby in the constitution of that 
character. She figured it to herself under the form of 
some well-proportioned classic building — the parts care- 
fully adjusted, every stone in its place, a sufficient amount 
of decoration to make it very agreeable to the eye, founda- 
tions, too, well planted, sunk deep. It had no secret 
chambers in it. It stood there orderly, finished, prepared 
to justify every legitimate demand ; presenting itself fear- 
lessly, proudly, arrogantly almost for observation. But it 
had not grown, it had been made. It was the result of 
effort, the result of tradition, of circumstance. Every 
building, unless actually ruinous, is capable of conversion 
into a prison, if needs be. And the feeling grew on Mary 
that the handsome building of Cyprian Aldham’s character 
was very capable of conversion into a prison for Cyprian 
Aldham’s wife. To be happy with him you must conform 
to his tastes, his wishes, his intentions— how very often, 
by the way, that phrase ‘ I intend * was on his lips ! And 
would she be able to conform and thus secure happiness ? 
Mary hoped so, hoped so honestly. She acknowledged to 
herself she had made a convenience of Aldham’s affection 
for her. She admitted she was under an obligation to 
him on that account. This made her scrupulously anxious 
to please him, scrupulously anxious to conform. And so 
she answered with a kind of serious playfulness now : 
* That is my desire/ 

‘Very well, then, you will enter into my scheme of 
making our house something by itself, a point of light in 


Two Idylls. 


339 


the rather foggy intellectual atmosphere of Midlandshire. 
Without vanity, I think I may say that I am of rather 
different calibre to the ordinary hard-riding country squire, 
as you are of very different calibre to his wife. And we 
must not permit ourselves to sink into the prevailing level, 
Mary. Perhaps in saying that I overstep the limits of 
probability. But even short of sinking to the level of our 
good neighbours, we might allow ourselves to deteriorate. 
Entre les aveugles un borgne est roi. And we may be 
tempted to grow lazy and be content with a one-eyed 
royalty. We must be on our guard against that. We 
must be quick to note any signs of intellectual indolence. 
Too many women, after marriage, cease to cultivate their 
accomplishments. You must not do so. You must con- 
tinue to read — we will read together. You must continue 
to paint.* 

Mr. Aldham certainly had no cause to complain of lack 
of due attention while making this speech. For Mary sat 
watching him thoughtfully. And as she watched, her 
sense of the obligation she had incurred towards him grew 
very irksome to her. Paint ! — the word, and she knew it, 
knew it every day more clearly, irrefragably, held for her 
the whole of a great rejected romance. In her present 
humour, under present circumstances, she wished never to 
touch a brush again. Yet there was her sense of obligation. 
She had not had the courage to accept that romance. 
She had made this man her way of escape from it. She 
was in his debt. Moreover, but one line of conduct would 
make life tolerable with him — the line of unconditional 
obedience. So she said : — 

‘ Very well. I understand. Reading will be delightful, 
of course. And, if you wish it, I will go on with my 
painting, such as it is.* 

1 Thanks. It is very pleasant to find you fall in so 
completely with my views. I am all the more anxious we 
should keep up to the mark in these matters, because in 
politics we shall be compelled to lag behind. My uncle is 
the staunchest of Tories. He and I agree to differ, on the 
understanding that I also agree to be silent. During his 
lifetime political society — such as we should both care for 
. — is impossible at Aldham Revel. But no embargo would 

Z 2 


340 


The Wages of Sin. 


be laid on our entertaining literary people and artists. 
Therefore I should be glad for you to maintain a connec- 
tion with any acquaintances of the kind whom you may 
have— with rising men like Mr. Colthurst, for instance.’ 

Involuntarily Miss Crookenden’s eyes sought the place 
on the mantelshelf where dog Toh had formerly been 
enthroned. 

* Judging by the way his this year’s pictures’are spoken 
of, Mr. Colthurst is no longer a rising man. He is a very 
positively risen man/ she said. ‘And we had better stick 
to the rising ones, Cyprian, I think, until we, too, have 
risen ; until Aldham Revel is a recognised second edition 
of Holland House, or Strawberry Hill. A little time will 
be needed to make it that, even though your calibre and 
mine is so very different to that of our country neighbours.’ 

Aldham raised his eyebrows slightly. Miss Crooken- 
den’s tone had a sudden flavour of sarcasm in it ; and 
sultans do not relish sarcasm from even the favourite light 
of the harem. 

‘ My dear Mary ? ’ he said slowly, interrogatively, 
restrainingly. 

It was the first time her lover had ventured on rebuke. 
This rebuke was delivered courteously enough ; yet the 
girl winced and started under it,. as a high-mettled horse 
will start under the gentlest application of whip or spur. 
She rose, and going to the table began arranging her 
presents again. 

Aldham leaned back in his chair, in somewhat austere 
silence. In his opinion Mary was distinctly in the wrong; 
it was therefore her place to make an advance in the 
direction of peace by speaking first. Some time, however, 
elapsed before the young lady saw fit to speak ; and then 
the subject she selected for conversation happened to be 
of a nature ill calculated to smooth ruffled plumes. 

‘ I should be glad to arrive at a clear understanding 
about one matter, Cyprian,’ she said, rather loftily, ‘ which 
so far has been neglected in all our plan-making. We 
have settled nothing about Sara Jacobini.’ 

Aldham rested his elbows on the arms of his chair, 
pressed the tips of his pointed fingers together and gazed 
at them with an air of withdrawnness and slight severity. 


Two Idylls. 


341 


4 1, too, should be glad to arrive at a definite understand- 
ing upon that point/ he observed. 

4 1 take for granted you will not wish her to leave me.’ 

‘ That depends upon what you may mean by leaving/ he 
answered, slowly. 4 You forget, perhaps, that you and I 
shall be my uncle’s guests — guests on a peculiar footing 
which confers a good many privileges • upon us, but still 
guests. To propose, as I proposed just now, we should 
ask agreeable people to stay in my uncle’s house for short 
periods, is one thing. To offer to a man of his age and 
habits, as permanent inmate, a lady with whom he has 
not the slightest connection, is quite another. It strikes 
me that in doing so we should be making a rather ex- 
cessive demand upon his hospitality.’ 

4 Pray don’t suppose that I have any wish to tax Sir 
Reginald’s hospitality by forcing my relations upon him/ 
Mary said quickly. 

Aldham ceased contemplating his finger-tips, raised his 
eyes to the girl’s face. The sharp edge of his nature made 
itself very sensibly felt just then. 

4 We seem to be at cross purposes. That is unfortunate/ 
he said. 4 Perhaps it would be as well if you explained your 
wishes a little more definitely. I really fail to apprehend 
them at present.- 

4 My wishes are very simple — that Sara should not lose 
her home ; that I should not lose her.’ 

4 The forming of new ties almost invariably necessitates 
the loosening of old ones/ Aldham remarked, a trifle — it 
must be owned — sententiously. 

4 Then, upon my word, I am not at all sure that forming 
new ties is not a mistake/ Miss Crookenden cried. 

Aldham rose from his chair, keeping his cold blue eyes 
fixed on her. 

4 Do you in the least realise what your words imply ? ’ 
he inquired. 

But here, before Mary had time to reply, the conversation 
suffered interruption in the agreeable form of Violet 
Winterbotham. That brilliant little lady entirely refused 
to admit that her Easter campaign had ended in defeat. 
Not a bit of it. It had ended in a draw ; and she fully 
counted on resuming play on some future occasion. 


342 


The Wages of Sin. 


Lancelot Crookenden had gone to shoot beasts and birds 
of sorts in Kashmir ; but Miss Violet belonged to a section 
of society in which journeys are the rule rather than the 
exception. She had no doubt he would return safe and 
sound, all in good time ; and the Kashmiree beauties gave 
her no anxiety. ' Mr. Crookenden wasn’t that sort of 
man, you know/ she said to herself with meaning; and 
her meaning was a perfectly just one. In the interval 
she determined to keep his family well in hand ; and in 
furtherance of this end displayed the warmest interest in 
the affairs of Miss Crookenden. 

1 Oh I I know it’s too bad to interrupt you like this, 
darling/ she exclaimed between effusive kisses on both 
cheeks — 1 because of course you and Mr. Aldham — how 
d’ye do, Mr. Aldham ? — must have such loads and loads oi 
delightful things to say to each other. And it must really 
be quite too odious for you to have people trotting in and 
out, specially in the morning. But I couldn’t resist. Mr. 
Aldham, really I couldn’t. I was simply expiring to see 
the new presents. She’s got such lovely ones, hasn’t 
she?’ 

Violet gave a sharp little cry; her manner became ab- 
solutely solemn. 

1 Why, Mary/ she said, * what diamonds ! Who did 
give them to you ? What — what diamonds ! ’ 

‘ Cyprian brought them to-day from Sir Reginald. 
They were Lady Aldham’s/ Mary answered, coldly. 

Miss Winterbotham bent down over the velvet cases ; 
then glanced up from under her pretty fringed eyelids with 
a look that had nothing in the least infantine in it. 

1 Ah 1 they’re family things — I s*ee— heirlooms.’ 

She paused a moment, then broke forth again into 
innocent, overflowing enthusiasm. 

t Well, I never saw anything so utterly lovely. Really, 
Mary, you are quite the luckiest girl in the world. Don’t 
you think so yourself? I am sure I should. Aren’t you 
frantically excited at having them ? I should be.’ — 
Violet clasped her hands and beamed. — *1 should want 
nothing more in life, Mr. Aldham, positively nothing, if 
I possessed those diamonds.’ 

' Mary is not as easily pleased as you are. She regards 


Two Idylls. 


343 


her possessions from a very philosophic standpoint/ 
Aldham permitted himself to reply, as he shook hands 
with Miss Winterbotham. 

* Ah ! this is quite too dreadful. I'm driving you away ? ' 
that young lady cried. 

* No, I was going in any case.' 

Violet moved aside, discreetly busying herself over the 
wedding presents. 

1 1 wonder if they'd kiss if I wasn’t here ? ' she thought. 
1 There, Mary's going after him. I hope she’ll leave the 
door open ; I should so like to see. Perhaps they'll kiss 
on the landing.' 

But Miss Crookenden made no offer of kissing her lover, 
though she approached him in a spirit of most disarming 
gentleness and apology. 

1 Cyprian, I am very sorry I have vexed you,’ she said. 

‘ Please fc rgive me. I spoke without thinking. Indeed, I 
don’t want to be troublesome or disagreeable. But life 
seems such a hustle just now; and I get rather off my 
balance sometimes. See, Cyprian, to show it's all right 
between us and that you're not very vexed with me, will 
you take me to the Academy this afternoon ? I know I 
have been tiresome about going there and fancied I never 
had time. But I will make time to go there or anywhere 
else you like to-day. And then we’ve a card for a 
big party at Mr. Carr’s to-night. I left the engagement 
open, meaning to shuffle out of it. But perhaps you 
would care for it ? All sorts of people will be there — the 
sort of people you were talking of having at Aldham. I 
don’t want to bother you ; but I am quite ready to go, 
and so will Sara be, if* it would amuse you at all to meet 
them.' 

Thus did Mary Crookenden strive to make it up with 
Cyprian Aldham, and succeeded. Flor he accepted both 
propositions. 

I And to-night,’ he said, ' you will wear the diamonds, 
that is if you want to please me.' 

I I do want to please you,' the girl answered, and her 
grave voice shook a little from the earnestness of that 
desire, 


344 


The Wages of Sin. 


BOOK VI.— SATAN AS AN ANGEL OF LIGHT. 

‘ Did I not tell you,’ he said, * that the jewel I had found was alive, and 
that it was a woman ? '—Papuan Legend. 


Chapter I. 

Adolphus Carr flew his kite with a long string to-night. 
For it was his happiness to entertain, not only persons, 
but a Personage. A Personage before whom you bent 
back or knee according to your sc x ; or despised and 
envied those who did so, not happening yourself to be 
among the number of the elect whom the said Personage 
graciously delighted to honour. Mr. Carr was very much 
in his element. He was a born courtier. His mind, civil 
to the point of indirectness, was quite at its ease in the 
extremely artificial atmosphere in which alone Royalty 
can exist. Not for a moment, however, must he be 
accused of being a toady. The courtier is as distinct from 
the toady, as the high comedy actor from the buffoon ; or 
the cultivated Anglican divine — such as our friend Mr. 
Aldham, for instance — from the street preacher bawling 
rudimentary salvation on the top of a tub. Adolphus Carr 
was none the less suave, none the less confidentially 
polite, to the rank and file of persons present because of 
the Personage present, likewise. *But he exercised a 
refined diplomacy in respect of them. He displayed most 
commendable tact in marshalling them, in making them 
circle round the royal centre, in getting them to come and 
go, do and say, just all* most calculated to please and amuse 
his royal guest. 

And this was hard work. But Mr. Carr relished it. 
Relished, too, by anticipation — for why should we 
squeamishly seek to place lights under bushels when they 
may illuminate the hearths and homes of countless fellow 
countrymen if set in the great candlestick of the Daily 


Satan as an Angel of Light. 


345 


Press ? — the very laudatory notices safe to appear (he had 
not forgotten to invite members of their respective staffs) 
in the Society Papers of the week. 

It was not every day Adolphus Carr entertained Royalty, 
and he was prepared to spare no expense. He took pains, 
moreover, to acquaint himself with any little tastes on the 
part of Royalty which it might be possible to gratify; and 
learning that his Hereditary Grand Duchess, in addition 
to her fondness for English letters and English art — which 
was easily enough gratified — possessed a fondness for 
white lilac, he loyally proceeded to turn his apartments 
into a garden and grove of those exquisite flowers. The 
night, for the time of year, was curiously hot. Three 
days of glorious weather appeared about to end in the 
thunderstorm, declared by our enemies invariably to give 
a playful finish to a British summer. A weight seemed to 
hang in the still air. And, as the hours passed and the 
crush thickened, the rooms, notwithstanding their height 
and long row of windows standing wide open on to the 
balcony — it had been tented in with pink and maize- 
coloured canvas, matted, supplied with seats, hung with 
lamps — the rooms, ? sa /, grew very much too warm for 
comfort, while the laint, dreamy, all-pervading scent of 
the lilacs became almost distressingly oppressive. 

So it seemed to Mary Crookenden at least. She had 
made due obeisance to Royalty, introduced Cyprian 
Aldham to notabilities various and sundry, received con- 
gratulations without number upon her approaching 
marriage ; and now, having escaped from the crush, stood 
fanning herself in one of the tall windows listening to a 
lively stream of talk poured forth by Antony Hammond. 

1 At last, my dear Miss Crookenden ! ’ he was saying 
gaily. ‘ It seems a small eternity that I have been steering 
my humble barque in the wake of your very august one 
through this weltering sea of rank, talent, and fashion. I 
thought I should never come up with you.’ 

Hammond, it need hardly be stated, was tremendously 
on the alert as to the young lady’s engagement. He was 
most curious to know how the fair taker of scalps bore 
herself under existing conditions. And it struck him now, 
that her bearing offered rich harvest of suggestion to the 


34 ^ 


The Wages of Sin. 


inquiring mind. Her dress was beyond all praise. That 
white cut-velvet train — Hammond always knew what 
women’s gowns were made of — over its white silk and lace 
petticoat, with its rather exaggerated scalloped silk ruche 
at the bottom ; those sleeves reduced to the modest limits 
— pace oh ! Puritans — of upstanding white velvet bows 
on the shoulder ; those really magnificent diamonds ; the 
lustrous though colourless complexion ; the delicate 
brownish shading of the eye-lids — Hammond was ravished, 
charmed. Afterwards, when people were talking a good 
deal about Miss Crookenden and her doings, he greatly 
relished describing her appearance that night. — ‘A sort of 
glorious ghost/ he said. * Impassive as Pygmalion’s statue 
before the silly fellow worried heaven into conferring the 
doubtfully beneficial gift of life upon it. Miss Crookenden’s 
beauty was in the grand style that night. I assure you it 
was absolutely prostrating.’ 

Immediately, however, Hammond exhibited no particular 
signs of prostration. He chatted away brightly enough. 

* As the vulgar little boys say, Carr has “ got ’em all 
on ” to-night, hasn’t he, Miss Crookenden ? This is his 
social apotheosis. I feel quite weighed down by the 
greatness of the occasion, don’t you ? It is immense, 
positively immense. Somebody ought to strike a medal in 
commemoration of it. And you see the point of the joke 
is, that no halt, no pause, no lapse is allowed in the 
procession of incidents and attractions. The cry is still 
il they come.” Just now a corvee of Irish members — very 
hairy — rushed in, the sitting being over or they possibly 
suspended for the night. A minute or two hence we 
shall be welcoming the actors, in their “ mere capacity of 
man ” — as the newspapers gracefully put it — and conse- 
quently very much the reverse of hairy, the performances 
at the theatre having concluded.’ 

Really the young lady’s impassivity amounted to being 
slightly disconcerting, Hammond thought. She could 
hardly take the trouble to raise a smile. — ‘ Is she craving, 
perhaps, for the society of the long-coated lover ? ' he 
asked himself. He whirled the string of his eye-glass 
round his finger, letting his easy light-hearted glance 
meanwhile wander over the crowd in search of the said 


Satan as an Angel of Light . 


347 


lover. But Mr. Aldham was not visible. Hammond 
applied himself to conversation once more. 

‘ It is hot — but hot/ he remarked. ‘If Carr had 
altogether risen to the occasion, if he was quite the 
perfect host he aspires to be, he would have supplied 
each of us with a little lump of ice to wear on our 
heads, like the New York omnibus horses, to enable us 
to bear up under this kaleidoscope of excitements com- 
bined with this sweltering night. Ah ! do just notice the 
angularity of Lady Theodosia Pringle’s curtsey to the 
hereditary representative of crowns and sceptres, Miss 
Crookenden ! The aroma of an earlier and more reverent 
age is about it. And now — really I must say Carr keeps 
the ball rolling with consummate ability — now, by way of 
contrast, we have the very last word of modernity in the 
shape of that anarchic, fire-brand of a creature — high priest 
of just all non-strenuous souls like myself implore to be 
permitted to ignore and forget — James Colthurst.’ 

Hammond surveyed his companion again. 

‘ Miss Crookenden, you are tired. I see it/ he said. 
1 You are bored. I know it. But do just oblige me by 
observing Colthurst behaving prettily to a Princess. 
There is a wealth of opposing sentiment in the situation 
which is delectable — very delectable indeed, if you permit 
your imagination to play freely around it. Believe me it 
is a unique little spectacle, one by no means to be 
missed.’ 

At last Hammond thought he had hit on a subject 
which interested Mary Crookenden. She turned her 
beautiful head, languidly and proudly, it is true, and gazed 
across the grove and garden of white lilac, past the groups 
of smart people, to the open space on the other side of the 
room where Royalty held its little court. But as she 
gazed her expression softened, her eyes dilated, kindled. 
Hammond talked on about Colthurst, the man’s singular 
views, his extravagant tendencies, his doll-nursing idiot, 
his chain -harrowing boy; and Pygmalion’s statue, mean- 
while, showed increasing signs of animation. So he 
fancied anyhow. His curiosity began to be seriously 
aroused. 

1 That wretched idiot’s face is as clever, in its way, as 


348 


The Wages of Sin. 


the woman’s in the u Road to Ruin/’ ’ he went on. ‘ It 
holds a marvel of meaning. If his colouring and work- 
manship were not so superb, one would really be disposed 
to wonder whether Colthurst had not mistaken his 
vocation, whether he wasn’t a great dramatist spoilt — ’ 

But Hammond left his sentence unfinished. For here 
Miss Crookenden indulged in an odd and most unexpected 
bit of by-play. Drew up her hands with a quick shudder- 
ing motion, covered her eyes with her fan. 

* Ah ! ah ! ’ she cried, softly suddenly ; 1 he has begun to 
stammer.’ 

Then she turned away, white cut-velvet train and all, 
and swept out of the window into the balcony, leaving 
Hammond literally with his mouth open, staring. 

' Ye gods and little fishes, what is the interpretation of 
this ? ’ he said to himself. He had never been more sur- 
prised in his life. 

As we know, Hammond was not always very scrupulous 
where his curiosity was engaged, and just now his curiosity 
was stimulated to the highest pitch. It stood on tiptoe. 
Yet it appeared to him that common courtesy demanded 
that he should pause, give Miss Crookenden time to 
recover herself, that he should not do anything calculated 
to place her in a still more awkward predicament. He 
had the good taste, moreover, to extract all hint of inquiry 
and comment from his countenance before he followed her. 
When at last he did so, he tried to make as unconcerned, 
as light and airy, an entrance on the scene as might be. 

< Yes, you are perfectly right to escape,’ he said ; 1 those 
rooms are villainously, really fiendishly hot, and it is a 
shade cooler out here, I believe.’ 

The pink and maize-coloured canvas of the roofs and 
walls tinged the whole atmosphere of the long dimly- 
lighted place with a sort of amber glow. And through 
this, so it struck Hammond, Mary Crookenden’s face 
showed singularly weary and care-worn, as she stood in 
her rich dress among the flowers with the cold brilliance 
of those superb jewels in her hair and upon her neck and 
bosom — a glorious, but really a quite uncomfortably 
ghostly young beauty. He had reckoned on finding her 
slightly defiant, as a woman usually is when she has 


Satan as an Angel of Light. 


349 


betrayed something — Hammond used that vague term, for 
precisely what she had betrayed he was at a loss to 
determine. But Mary was not defiant. He could almost 
have believed she was frightened. 

* 0 ! it is terribly hot/ she said. 1 The heat distracts 
me. It makes me quite ill. Have you any idea where 
Madame Jacobini and Cyprian Aldham are, Mr. Hammond? 
Will you help me to find them ? I can’t stay here any 
longer. He must take me home.’ 

' 1 won’t help you to find Mr. Aldham, because — pardon 
a dogmatic tone, Miss Crookenden — I won’t consent to 
your facing those basting rooms again. But I will find 
him myself and bring him here to you. Do you mind 
waiting ? ’ 

Mary hesitated. 

1 1 don’t know,’ she said; I would rather go with you. 

But Hammond for once in his life was obdurate. 

' My dear Miss Crookenden, be admonished ! Don’t 
venture into that furnace ; you are evidently very tired. Sit 
down in the big chair yonder — you see ? — right at the end. 
No one will molest you. They are mostly too busy staring 
at the Hereditary Grand Duchess; and Desborough is 
just beginning to recite some blood-curdling delight of a 
piece, which the lovers of emotion are trooping away to 
hear — just observe how they are all clearing out. You 
will be alone here and fairly cool. And it will take me 
precisely half the time to lay hands on Mr. Aldham if I go 
by myself. Find him I will, and that speedily, or perish 
in the attempt.’ 

Hammond smiled very pleasantly at the young girl. 
Her pathetic face taken in conjunction with her gorgeous 
attire made him feel deliciously sentimental. Little verses 
began to come into his head. Hammond quite hugged 
himself over the episode. But what did it portend ? What, 
indeed what ? 

Mary made an effort to smile in return, but her lips 
were strangely stiff. The smile was not a happy one. 

* Thanks so much. Please tell him I must go,’ she said. 
'Tell him not to be long, Cyprian is so deliberate. And 
I want to go home at once — at once.’ 


350 


The Wages of Sin. 


Chapter II. 

Taken fairly, along with their context, the most astonish- 
ing affairs become comprehensible enough. The difficulty 
is to get hold of the context ; and that is just why the 
conduct of even the most respectable of our fellow crea- 
tures presents to us such an endless tangle of contradic- 
tions, ineptitudes, inexplicabilities, and general wrong 
reason run riot. 

Which observations find apposite illustration in the 
small affair, just recorded, which so taxed Antony Ham- 
mond’s acuteness. To the one person able to supply the 
context — namely, Mary Crookenden — that affair was 
comprehensible to the point of humiliation. Precisely 
because she dreaded an episode of this description had 
she been anxious to * shuffle out ’ of going to Mr. Carr's 
great party. Then her little quarrel with her lover had 
supervened. Wishing earnestly to make it up with him, 
to cancel their difference by presentation of some suitable 
peace-offering, she had defied the dread, risked the epi- 
sode. And now, as she waited at the end of the balcony, 
the episode confronted her as an accomplished fact. She 
contemplated it in all its aspects and beatings ; and, poor 
child, — poor for all her pride and fine clothing, — as she 
did so her heart grew heavy as lead. And unhappily she 
had plenty of leisure for contemplation, the wheels of 
Cyprian Aldham’s chariot tarried most unaccountably. 
She could think undisturbed. For the chair to which 
Hammond had directed her, was shut in, hidden away 
behind a flowery promontory of white lilac bushes with an 
undergrowth of azaleas and gladiolas extending more than 
half the width of the balcony, and leaving only a narrow 
passage against the inside wall. 

Mary Crookenden has retained a very lively remem- 
brance of every detail of her vigil in that oppressively 
fragrant little spot. Of the six-sided red glass and brass 
lamp hanging in the centre, the chain of it vibrating 
slightly from the out draught. Of the rosy reflections 
cast by it upon the lilacs and azaleas. Of the slight 


Satan as an Angel of Light. 


351 


clinging roughness— against her bare arm — of the pattern 
of the brocaded chair-cover, on which bunches of dim- 
hued carnations straggled across an ash-blue ground. 
Of the rich amber glow filling all the long perspective of 
the tented space. Of figures passing to and fro, or 
grouped about the windows of the brilliant rooms. Of 
the well-modulated murmur of conversation. Of the 
reciter’s voice, now passionate, now appealing, rising in 
some declamatory passage, falling in some pathetic one ; 
the tones of it singularly agitating — though the words 
recited were indistinguishable — amid the heat, the rich 
subdued bri, htness, the cloying sweetness of flowers. 
And then right before her — striking a very different note 
— an arched draped opening on to the darkness of the 
river and the night. Through this, as she sat there, she 
could just make out the line of the opposite shore. Lights 
reflected down upon the oily swirling water — current 
flowing, tide ebbing, away together past the roar and tur- 
moil of the city towards the freshness and silence of the 
sea. Buildings, towers, great chimneys, black against a 
vague luridness behind them thrown upward, through the 
close thick air, from the network of teeming streets lying 
back between Lambeth and Vauxhall. Over all this 
another blackness of gathering cloud. Cloud big with 
storm, boiling up from south and east, though the wind 
was dead still. And in Mary Crookenden’s mind 
meanwhile, sense of disquieting self-revelation, of moral 
confusion ; sense, moreover, that struggle with that 
confusion only entangled her conscience and reason more 
and more hopelessly, as in the meshes of some cruel net. 
Not right and wrong, but right and right, not truth and 
falsehood, but truth and truth, appeared to her sadly in 
conflict just then. And it was of the very essence of the 
case that she could ask no advice, seek no counsel. Act- 
ing at once as advocate for each side and as judge, she 
must argue the question, give the verdict, bear — perhaps 
— the weight of long punishment, unaided, silently, by 
and for herself. 

Yet the episode in itself remained comprehensible 
enough. She had honestly wished to avoid seeing Colt- 
hurst again, on this side her marriage at all events. Now 


352 


The Wages of Sin. 


she had seen him and her first sight of him had been 
alarmingly pleasant. It appeased her pride, it went to 
justify her past thought of him. — That word 1 bounder ' 
of Lancelot’s had rankled in her mind. — For she saw that 
here, among all these people, Colthurst’s personality re- 
mained distinct ; and that not by doubtful virtue of out- 
ward eccentricity, but by positive virtue of being an 
undeniably telling figure. Colthurst, indeed, had sloughed 
off much of his outward eccentricity in the last few 
months. The habit of rule, sufficiency of means, the 
comfortable knowledge of an assured success, had in- 
creased his social self-confidence and given him ease of 
manner. Looking, as he looked now standing talking to 
Adolphus Carr’s Princess, Mary Crookenden felt he was 
not a man whom any woman need be ashamed of going 
into the world with. His appearance, like his work, 
might provoke comment, but comment would hardly be of 
the patronizing, supercilious sort. 

All this she perceived almost at a glance. Perceived 
it with an odd mixture of satisfaction and of uneasiness, 
knowing that she had infinitely better perceive nothing — 
that perceptions down these lines were dangerous, not to 
say wrong. Perceived it, moreover, with the glamour of 
those pictures of his, which she had looked at in company 
with Aldham at the Academy only a few hours ago, still 
strong upon her. For their virility, the consummate art, 
the large insight of them had affected her profoundly. 
And then, by an unkind little accident, as she watched 
him, listening all the while to Hammond’s half-malicious, 
half-laudatory talk, it fell out that suddenly, unexpectedly, 
the attraction of Colthurst’s weakness was added to the 
attraction of his strength. For looking about him, in that 
restless w*ay of his, during a rather involved declaration 
of artistic faith on the part of the Royal lady, Colthurst’s 
eyes had met hers. He became aware of her, aware she 
was watching him. The whole man had changed some- 
how. A certain excitement shook him. He began to 
hesitate in answering the declaration of faith, to stammer, 
and that badly. And perceiving this and how it came 
about, a desperation of pity, of anger that he should be 
at a disadvantage, of longing to help him shelter him, 


Satan as an Angel of Light. 


353 


stand between him and all possibility of ridicule, had 
arisen in Mary Crookenden, had made her cry out, and 
then, in shame and fear, had made her turn and fly. No 
wonder, I think, sitting alone, contemplating the episode 
in all its bearings the girl’s heart grew heavy as lead. 

Her first instinct had been to seek safety with Aldham, 
to get him to lead her out of temptation, to take her away. 
Now as she waited for him, while the air became more 
oppressive, the heat greater, the fragrance of the flowers 
more close and clinging — a presence rather than a scent — - 
that idea of the necessity of rescue amplified itself. Not 
only from this place, from the subtle influence of James 
Colthurst’s near neighbourhood, must Aldham take her; 
but from all her old life, its associations, its aspirations, 
its surroundings, its fancies — and that as soon as possible. 
They were to be married — why wait ? Why not be mar- 
ried at once ? Only the completion of her trousseau 
stood in the way. And hadn't she plenty of clothes 
already ? What did a gown more or less matter as com- 
pared with this horrible state of moral confusion ? Mary 
vras fairly terrified. To fix the great gulf of marriage — 
and to a high-minded young girl that gulf happily seems 
a very, very great one — between herself and the man who 
so strangely affected and attracted her — the man who told 
her he loved her and made her feel the truth of that tell- 
ing as no man ever had before — told her also his love was 
hopeless, prayed passionately it might be kept so — the 
man in whose life was something obscure and hidden — 
Lancelot’s hinted story, the haunting face of the woman 
of Slerracombe Deer Park — to place, once and for all, 
between herself and this man, solemn vows ratified by a 
sacred ceremony; to place between herself and him the 
mysterious change from maid to wife ; — this seemed to 
Mary Crookenden her only chance of peace, of a quiet 
mind, of a conscience void of offence. 

And, as the minutes passed and still Aldham did not 
come, this idea of the necessity for haste, for action imme- 
diate and final, deepened in her, possessed her, worked upon 
her till the nervous tension became almost intolerable. 

No doubt Mary’s distress of mind was aggravated 
by physical causes, by the highly electric state of the 


354 


The Wages of Sin. 


atmosphere. For, more than once while she waited, 
the whole southern heaven had opened for an instant 
— buildings, towers, great chimneys along the further 
shore standing out sharp-edged against a sheet of peach- 
bloom light. The river became mystically radiant, its 
bridges, the barges lying in mid-stream, the long pale line 
of the embankment as clear as day. Fo; an instant only. 
Then the lamps which had grown pallid and ghostly re- 
asserted themselves. Ni^ht — there without all blank, 
black, stifling — here within, voluptuous with sound, colour, 
fragrance — closed down again. 

A man's shadow thrown upon the lilacs and azaleas, 
doubled queerly by the crossing lights. Mary was past/ 
caring about appearances, past caring whether her words 
and aspect might seem peculiar to those ignorant of the 
context. She thought Aldham had come at last. She 
rose to her feet. 

1 Oh ! Cyprian, Cyprian/ she cried, 1 take me away, 
take me home now, directly, before the storm breaks.’ 

Rose, turned to the narrow passage between the banked- 
up flowers and the wall, to find herself face to face with 
James Colthurst. 

‘ D-don’t be afraid of the storm, Miss Crookenden/ he 
said in the rapid whispering way of his. 1 There is n-no 
hurry. I assure you it won’t b-break just yet.’ 

And Mary sunk down in her chair again, a kind of 
despair upon her. Despair none the less honest and vital 
because she knew that at bottom she was glad, royally, 
triumphantly glad. Thus with jarring, discordant music, 
and in most questionable shape, does the great god Love 
batter his way into some women’s hearts. 

But the great god had only carried the outworks after 
all. For the girl’s innate rectitude, loyalty, sense of the 
binding nature of a promise voluntarily given rallied and 
valiantly withstood the entrance of the enemy. If there is 
no treachery within the walls, why, the great god may have 
to retreat discomfited even yet. Mary could still resist, 
did instinctively proudly resist; but she could not take 
the offensive, make a sally, cut her way out. That was be- 
yond her power of will. She waited silent, slowly fanning 
herself. 


Satan as an Angel of % Light . 


355 


Colthurst had come within the flowery promontory. He 
moved across and looked away up the river watching the 
up-boiling cloud, for he did not care to look at Miss 
Crookenden just yet. He still cherished his dream of 
ideally chivalrous behaviour towards this woman. And 
he held it sentimental cant to assert that beauty when least 
adorned is most adorned. Not a bit of it. A woman's 
beauty gains by fine dressing, as a precious stone by fine 
setting. Colthurst knew that Miss Crookenden was re- 
splendent to-night. He did not want to know more, to 
know the details of that splendour, until the excitement of 
finding himself here alone with her had somewhat worn 
off. The emotional side of his nature was ready enough to 
develop dangerous energy under existing circumstances — 
and then the tones of her voice, calling out, just now, 
as she supposed, to her lover, had cut him to the very 
quick. 

1 The storm's a 1-long way off yet,' he repeated, just for 
the sake of saying something. 

Mary made no answer. Colthurst paused for a brief 
space. The heat, the fragrance, the silence in which he 
became moment by moment more intimately sensible of 
her, there, close by, the beauty of her person enhanced by 
her appointments and surroundings — all this wrought on 
him, produced in him a distracting restlessness. To carry 
it off he began talking, caring little enough about the 
subject so long as he did talk. 

1 You heard, I dare say, that I ended by taking the 
Connop School ? ' 

* Yes, I heard you had taken it,' Mary said. 

She fanned herself steadily. The regular mechanical 
beat was helpful to the maintenance of self-possession. 
And she, too, needed help towards that end just now. 

* I hope the work goes on well ? ' ' 

* Oh ! the work goes on well enough/ Colthurst 
answered with a certain impatience, still watching the up- 
boiling cloud. 1 1 am weeding out the incapables by a 
p-process of inevitable natural selection which rather scares 
B-Barwell. He says I shall empty the school if I p-press 
the students so hard. B-but I don't agree. I shall only 
kill off the ones who have no stamina. And I am p-per- 

A a 2 


35*5 


The Wages of Sin. 


fectly willing to do that. I have no use for rickety 
creatures. Art has no use for them. I am d-delighted to 
help them to select themselves out of existence. I r-really 
am doing them a kindness in helping them to disappear.’ 

1 Poor things ! ’ Mary Crookenden exclaimed softly, 
almost involuntarily. 

Colthurst looked round at her. There was a curious 
fierceness in his expression. 

1 You think me b-brutal, Miss Crookenden/ he stammered. 

‘ I don’t think anything/ she answered, hurriedly, 1 but 
that I am glad the work goes on well — that you should be 
satisfied.' 

Colthurst gazed away up the river again. Once more 
the southern sky opened, and all the scene without 
showed clear. Whether it was only the change from the 
warm lamplight to that unearthly flickering pallor of the 
sheet-lightning Mary could not tell, but Colthurst’s face 
seemed to her a revelation of how much sorrow a human 
countenance can hold. The sorrow was not showy, 
theatrical, obtrusive, but it was none the less penetrating 
for that. 

‘ I am not satisfied/ he said. ‘ I longed for the school ; 
I thought I could do a lot with it. I got it. I am d-doing 
a lot with it. I had my d-desire. I have leanness withal 
in my soul. Why not ? The two things generally go to- 
gether, I suppose.’ 

' Ah ! but, — ’ the girl put in eagerly — she could not help it 
— the longing to comfort this strong, dominating aggressive 
being overmastered every prudential consideration — it had 
done so before . — 1 But there are your pictures. Surely 
you find satisfaction in them? I saw them to-day. No 
other pictures in the place are within a hundred miles of 
them. They are magnificent. They must satisfy you.’ 

‘ Of course I am p-pleased with them/ Colthurst said. 
* Of course I am fond of them. Of course in a degree, I 
glory in them. It would be a very paltry pretence of 
humility to deny that. For no one can measure the worth 
of his work like the artist himself — that is obvious, I 
think. He only knows all that has been p-put into it. 
Still more perhaps all that has been p-put out of it — re- 
jected, refused. For the best work is always built up on 


Satan as an Angel of Light. 


357 


refusal somehow, on obedience to the “ thou shalt not ” 
even more than to the “thou shalt.” B-but then, just in 
proportion as the work is good, complete in itself, an 
actual creation, it becomes impersonal — is outside of you, 
has an independent life. Your reason and your artistic 
sense acquiesce in that. Your brain is content it should 
be so ; your ambition is gratified/ 

As usual, Colthurst's nervousness had worn off under 
the relief of self-expression. He held himseif upright, 
standing directly in front of Mary Crookenden, looking 
full at her. 

‘The m-man in you is satisfied, in short/ he said. 
' B-but alas ! there is a good deal besides the man in most 
of us artists. There is the child — the everlasting up- 
springing of youth, which is at once our curse and the 
secret of our power. And the child isn’t satisfied. The 
child doesn’t care two raps for laborious success, the 
creative gift, for acquiescent reason, or gratified ambition, 
Miss Crookenden. It cries out for toys, for p-playfellows, 
for sunshine, and d-dear, silly little pleasures; a home to 
come back to at night when it’s tired ; 1-loving arms to 
hold it ; a lullaby of laughter and kisses.’ 

Colthurst’s stammer grew somewhat unmanageable as 
he said the last few words. He looked down, wrenching 
oddly at his shirt collar. 

‘ S-satisfied ? Is anybody satisfied, I wonder ? ’ he 
repeated. Then he raised his eyes to the girl’s face. ‘ Are 
you satisfied, Miss Crookenden ? ’ he asked, quite gently. 
‘ If what one hears of your prospects is true — I hope it is 
— you have more cause for satisfaction than most of us. 
We hear you are going to make an ideal marriage — a 
marriage that has everything to recommend it, not a 
single d-drawback. Is it so ? ’ 

Mary fanned herself slowly, unceasingly. The heat 
seemed to her breathless. 

‘ Yes,’ she said. 

‘ You are satisfied then ? ’ 

Colthurst too found the heat breathless. 

Ah ! self-confident and altogether too deliberate clerical 
lover, for pity's sake make haste ! If rescue is to beat all it 
must be speedy, for though the garrison holding the citadel 


358 


The Wages of Sin . 


of your mistress* heart shows a good front to the enemy, it 
is in sore straits. 

Mary Crookenden stopped fanning herself. She carried 
her head haughtily. 

‘What right have you to ask me such a question? 
You have no right/ she said, and once more the fan 
took up its steady rhythmical movement. 

Colthurst looked down again. 

‘ B-by a d-death-bed, Miss Crookenden, one doesn’t stop 
to carefully consider rights. One acts upon impulse, regard- 
less of conventionalities. Here by the death-bed of the love 
I have borne you I dare to ask strange questions — and if 
you are kind you will answer them. From the first I 
knew that love was doomed. It was not in the nature of 
things it could live. N-now it is in its agony. Very 
soon 1 shall be forced to lay it in its coffin and go on my 
way as best I can without the tormenting joy and solace 
of it. Don’t misunderstand me,' he added. 1 1 am not 
making an appeal. I am merely stating facts. Facts of 
which I recognize the inevitable fitness as — well — as a 
fairly reasonable lost soul may be supposed to recognize 
the fitness of its own damnation. Only I think I should 
recognize that necessary fitness more completely — and, 
intellectually, anyhow, it would be a consolation to recog- 
nize it as fully as possible — if I had reason to believe you 
at least were happy. If I knew not only the woman-of- 
the-world in you is satisfied, but that the child is satisfied 
likewise ; that it has found toys, a p-playfellow, a home — 
and that 1-lullaby — and so is content.’ 

Colthurst spoke quite calmly. He stood near in the 
centre of the draped opening, his face and the upper part 
of his figure bathed in the dreamy amber-rose of the 
lamplight, showing in high relief against the gloom of 
cloud, and river, and night behind him. While across 
that gloom, now and again, the lightning leapt and flitted 
with, so it seemed to Mary Crookenden, a kind of evil 
quickness —at once a mockery and a menace, producing in 
her an indefinable terror. She hesitated, the apprehen- 
sion of a great crisis upon her. Then in desperation of 
loyalty she lied ; lied bravely, roundly, knowing that she 
lied, looking him in the face. 


Satan as an Angel of Light. 


359 


* Since you press the question home/ she said, ‘ yes, I 
am satisfied; I have found all I want.' 

1 Ah ! that is well — d-damnation becomes almost pala- 
table/ Colthurst said. 

He leaned his elbows on the balustrade of the balcony, 
gazed down at the long row of carriages drawn up along 
the kerb each with its double dot of light, at the waiting 
men-servants chatting in groups on the pavement, at the 
swirl of the flowing current and ebbing tide. Colthurst 
had hardly realised until now how much it would cost him 
to screw down the lid of this love’s coffin. The chill 
pride that had come back to Miss Crookenden’s bearing in 
the last few minutes only charmed him the more. His 
relation to her all along, save during that interview in the 
drawing theatre of the Connop School, had been fantasti- 
cal, shadowy, unsubstantial. Yet in closing it — and that 
truly honouring her he was called upon now to close it, 
Colthurst never doubted — it seemed to him that he parted 
with the best thing he had had in life. 

A huffle of wind, hot with the festering reek of the 
crowded streets away across the river, fluttered the leaves 
of the plane trees along the embankment, swept up and 
about him, the stale odours borne on it for the moment 
overpowering the sweetness of the flowers. Then the air 
fell dead still again, while the thunder rolled and rattled 
away down in the south. The wind affected him oddly. 
To him it bore something beside the stagnant reek of the 
streets. It bore a message from out of the stagnant 
profitless lives of Jenny Parris and little Dot. Colthurst 
was in the morbid humour in which it is possible to find 
absolute enjoyment in accentuating one's own suffering. A 
spirit of fantastic self-abnegation had possession of him. 
And so he asked himself — half from sheer hopelessness, 
half in obedience to the high ideal of conduct his love for 
Mary Crookenden had generated in him — why should he 
not right the wrong he had done Jenny in a measure at 
all events ? Why cling so determinedly to the fact of 
legal freedom, since, with Mary Crookenden’s marriage, 
the one thing which had given legal freedom a certain 
subjective value was irrevocably lost ? Why not marry 
Jenny Parris, and so take the stigma of shame off little 


36 o 


The Wages of Sin. 


Dot ? He had no love to give Jenny Parris. She had 
strangled all love in him. She jarred him through and 
through, every fibre of him, like the sound of an instru- 
ment out of tune. She could never be more than his wife 
in name. But his name he could give her. He could go 
to the nearest Registry Office with her, make — in her own 
eyes — an honest woman of her; make his will too, settle 
the not contemptible sum coming in for these pictures of 
his on her and on his daughter, little Dot — and so pay a 
part, at least, of the debt he owed her. As the concep- 
tion formed itself in Colthurst’s mind, rapidly and with 
curious completeness of detail, the vision it called up was 
dreary, arid, dingy to the point of heart-break. He did 
not care. To him, just now, the very merit of the con- 
ception lay in the vulgar commonplace misery of it. 

The wind huffled again. The thunder rattled out 
somewhat nearer. Colthurst raised himself, turned round, 
a smile on his lips. The contrast between what he saw 
in imagination and saw in fact was sufficiently violent. 
Mary Crookenden stood upright, looking away down the 
length of the balcony — which was singularly provoking to 
the senses in its cunningly blended colours, cunningly 
disposed lights, flowers, furnishings — her beauty empha- 
sized by her rich dress, her flashing diamonds, by the 
stately pose of her figure and the carriage of her head. 
Colthurst was filled with a madness of worship for her. 
Not only of worship for her physical beauty, but for her 
maidenhood, for the unstained fairness and purity of her. 
The Registry Office and Jenny Parris — yes. But first a 
word of kindness, a trifle of hope ! 

‘ Miss Crookenden/ he said, 1 1 have talked too much. 
You want to get aw T ay from me. I d-don’t want to 
bother you ; but before you go just this. — I had some con- 
versation with Mr. Aldham when I first came in to-night. 
He tells me he cares for pictures. He was good enough 
to ask me down to your future - home — later, in the 
autumn, you know, when you are settled there/ 

The girl turned her head. And Colthurst remarked — 
as Hammond had remarked already — that she looked 
very fragile, ghostly almost. Her mouth w 7 as slightly 
open, and an expression of startled alarm made her eyes 


Satan as an Angel of Light . 


361 


wide and wild. Twice she tried to interrupt, tried to stop 
him. But Colthurst refused to be stopped. 

1 No — let me go on. It’s a very small matter. Let me 
go on/ he entreated. 1 Don’t suppose that I should be in 
your way, or that I should demand more from you than 
the most casual acquaintance among your guests. I 
should be just an odd man in a big house-party, had down 
to make up the number, to take any young lady in to 
dinner who didn’t happen to be better provided for, while 
I paid for my keep in the smallest small-talk I could 
raise. I know myself p-pretty thoroughly. I know what 
is within and what is b-beyond my strength. This is 
within it. I should be wholly unobjectionable.’ Colthurst 
smiled at her. — * Wholly unobjectionable/ he repeated. 
1 So my coming would make no difference to you, and to 
me it would make just all the difference. It would be the 
grating through which one catches a glimpse of the blue 
sky in prison. It would — we were speaking of lost souls 
just now, you know — well, it would be Judas Iscariot’s 
twelve hours’ rest from hell in the cool and peace of the 
polar night.’ 

His speech was low, broken, eager, to his hearer 
cruelly moving. 

Oh ! Cyprian Aldham, Cyprian Aldham, who shall 
awake in you a sense of your danger ? Rome is burning 
while you, frigidly punctilious young gentleman, are 
gracefully fiddling — fiddling to poor old Lady Theodosia 
Pringle, whom your host has bidden you take in to 
supper. Will you risk losing your wife to save your fine 
manners ? In common modesty wait, at least, until she 
be indeed your wife before you thus make display of your 
self-respecting good breeding at her expense. The flesh 
has little enough power to tempt you, high-minded dainty- 
natured person that you are. But can we say as much 
for the world ? Make haste, bestir yourself, hurry for 
once, putting your self-complacency in your pocket ; or I 
very much fear when at last you arrive, you will arrive 
altogether too late. 

‘ D-don’t blot out the scrap of blue sky/ Colthurst 
stammered. ' Don’t cut Judas off his twelve hours’ respite 
from pain. You have all you want. You are satisfied. 


362 


The Wages of Sin. 


so to you it couldn’t matter. To me it would bring infinite 
good. Let me come.’ 

But Mary Crookenden threw out her hands in passionate 
imploring rejection. 

I Ah ! no. God forbid. Anything but that,’ she 
exclaimed. 

Colthurst was keenly hurt. 

* What have I done to you that you should hate me 
so ? ’ he asked fiercely. 1 1 don’t deserve it.’ 

I I do not hate you. It would be happier for me if I 
did/ Mary answered ; and then her voice rose into a cry. 

For the storm had broken at last. Broken in rough 
unseemly tumult. Nature declaring her eternal supremacy 
even here, amid miles of brick and mortar, despite of 
buildings, pavings, bridgings, tunnellings, despite too of 
human millineries and masqueradings. Broken, in blind- 
ing glare of lightning, and boisterous in-rushing wind that 
made the lamps sway and the tender greenhouse-grown 
lilacs writhe and shiver, and the draperies flap in wild 
confusion and tear at their fastenings. While the thunder 
pealed out overhead — a deafening, metallic crackle and 
roar, that went booming away, volley upon volley, up the 
course of the river into the far distance. Followed by a 
downpour of rain — the great drops beating in, insolently 
careless of Adolphus Carr’s elegant upholsteries ; beating 
in till they splashed chill on the girl’s bare neck and 
shoulders. 

Mary had been wrought up to a pitch of emotion in 
which ordinary incidents take on most portentous colours. 
The flash and clap, coming at that moment, begot in her a 
panic of fear as of impending judgment ; while the cold 
whip of the rain laid on her delicate flesh — so unaccus- 
tomed to the most distant hint of ill-usage — appeared an 
indignity, a cruelty, inducing in her a desolating sense of 
loneliness and friendlessness. So that it made the sobs 
rise in her throat, encircled by that brilliant weight of 
diamonds, even as wind and wet and callousness of nature 
to human distress make sobs rise in the throat of the 
ragged tramp huddled, shivering, under the hedge. All 
this was an affair of seconds. Then, though her eyes were 
closed — she had shut them to keep out the leaping glare 


Satan as an Angel of Light 


363 


of the lightning — she was aware of Colthurst close to her, 
standing between her and the in-beating rain, sheltering 
her, holding her hand quietly, with unaccentuated pressure, 
as he had held it once before. Aware that his presence, 
the personality and genius of the man, enfolded her, held 
her whole being spiritually as he held her hand actually 
in the steady clasp of his own. 

One is told that in drowning, when the first instinctive 
passionate struggle for life is over, there comes a self- 
abandonment which is almost luxurious, a joy of yielding 
weakness the more exquisite because of the fearfulness of 
past conflict. Mary experienced something of this just 
now. The struggle of loyalty, the fight for independence 
were pretty well over. Our proud, milk-white maiden 
began to drown peacefully, willingly, not indeed without a 
certain exultation. The sobs sank away. She opened 
her eyes, and looked with a sort of wonder at the lilac 
blossoms scattered on the ground, at the long length of 
the balcony, a queer effect of wreck and disorder upon it. 
The wind was falling again, the lightning was less vivid, 
and there were lengthening pauses between the thunder- 
claps. Servants came hurrying out to tidy away the 
traces of disaster and close the tall windows of the rooms. 

Colthurst quietly unclasped her hand. 

* You m-must go inside out of all this/ he said. 1 The 
worst is over — and for me the b-best is over too.* 

The note of hopelessness in these last few words 
aroused Mary Crookenden. She ceased to drown peace- 
fully. The moral struggle was renewed. But it was 
renewed on other lines. She could not look her position 
fairly in the face as yet. She was too close to it. It was 
not possible to see it in the perspective which alone could 
make it intelligible. But upon one point she was resolved 
her mind should be set at rest. So she took her courage 
in both hands, turned and asked Colthurst the question 
plainly — baldly, if you will — which she had asked herself 
a hundred times since the sunny afternoon in Slerracombe 
Deer Park, when she had recognized them both — the man 
and woman of the 1 Road to Ruin.' 

* Tell me,' she said, almost sternly — ' what is the mean- 
ing of the despairing tone in which you speak about 


3^4 


The Pipages of Sin . 


yourself, about your life, about love ? Why is it ? Are 
you married already ? ’ 

Colthurst moved a step back, with a queer upward jerk of 
his head as though he had been struck. He hesitated, 
while Mary stood watching him, her eyes fixed on him ; 
while the rain streamed down on the canvas roof; while 
the servants moved to and fro, and the frightened carriage 
horses backed and plunged in the street below. The cool 
calculating side of Colthurst came to the fore. With 
unsparing directness it put the case before him. To say 
yes, and so save this woman whom he so dearly and 
devoutly worshipped from all possibility of defilement, all 
possibility of entanglement with these two sad, profitless 
lives, bound up irrevocably with his own ? To say yes, 
merely forestalling fact by a few hours, and give Jenny 
Parris legal right to his name and to whatever of money 
and position might go along with it before this day, just 
beginning, had run out ? Or to say no — to repudiate 
Jenny’s moral claim on him once and for all ? To declare 
himself free and take his chance ? — And what a chance 1 
What intoxicating delight that chance offered if he read 
Mary Crookenden’s question aright. The rage of living 
was still strong in Colthurst for all his morbidness, for all 
his fanatic fancies. The thought of that chance made 
him set his teeth, while the blood throbbed through his 
veins like liquid fire. — But then again the risk of eventual 
misery to her. What had he said himself? The finest 
work is grounded in refusal ; built upon * thou shalt not ’ 
rather than ‘ thou shalt.’ Was it so with the finest love ? 
And then Colthurst saw that the most excellent way, the 
most splendid proof of his true love for Mary Crookenden 
lay in refusal — the most excellent way for him — good 
God ! the tragedy, the bathos of it — led slap into the open 
door of the Registry Office side by side with the bastard 
and the harlot. 

With a desperate courage he met the girl’s serious, 
questioning gaze. Tried to tell her. Tried, in terms as 
little offensive as possible, to explain. But the words 
would not get themselves spoken. In his extremity his 
stammer once again became absolutely unmanageable. 

At that moment two gentlemen came towards them. 


Satan as an Angel of Light. 


365 


The foremost was Cyprian Aldham — Cyprian Aldham at 
last. Then the tormenting, debasing, insoluble riddle of 
sex obtruded itself, would take no denial, made its voice 
heard. And Colthurst fell. For the sight of Mary 
Crookenden’ s affianced husband coming thus to claim her, 
provoked in him the blind fury of jealousy towards a rival 
common, alas ! to man and beast alike. His whole moral 
attitude changed. The real rose up and murdered the 
ideal, as in vigorous natures possessed of vigorous passions, 
at times, it inevitably will and must. Not as some high- 
exalted, spiritually-apprehended incarnation of inaccessible 
maidenhood did Colthurst now behold Mary Crookenden, 
but as sweet flesh and blood woman, to be wooed and won, 
to be rejoiced over as bride and wife, to lie in his bosom, 
and be at once — so strangely contradictory is man’s desire 
— his goddess and his property, his inspiration and in a 
sense his slave. By a tremendous effort he mastered his 
stammering tongue. 

1 Married ? N-no no. Ten thousand times no,’ he 
said. 


Chapter III. 

The week following Mr. Carr’s royal entertainment was 
not one of precisely millennial peace and security to the 
students of the Connop School. They went delicately, 
like unhappy Agag, having a general sense of hewing in 
pieces disagreeably imminent. Colthurst’s moods, as we 
are aware, had a habit of making themselves felt; and 
his present mood was a peculiarly withdrawn and pre- 
occupied one, out of which he seemed to rush at intervals, 
as out of some cavern, armed with truly startling powers 
of invective and. mordant criticism. He was, it must be 
conceded, ill to live with during that week. But to no 
one worse to live with than to himself. For the end of 
his interview with Miss Crookenden had left him sus- 
pended, like Mohammed’s coffin, between earth and 
heaven ; and which of the two was designed to be his 
eventual resting-place he had as yet no means to dete - 


366 


The Wages of Sin. 


mine. Aldham and Hammond had come, and Miss 
Crookenden had gone away with them. The whole 
business, so far as he was concerned, had been cut off 
clean, as with a knife. 

How much her question had meant, for how much his 
answer might be taken to stand, the full significance of her 
declaration that it would perhaps be happier for her if she 
did hate him — on these cardinal points Colthurst was 
painfully in suspense. And he saw no practicable way 
of relieving his suspense. There were reasons in plenty, 
to his thinking, which rendered it obviously impossible for 
him to go and ask Miss Crookenden for explanations. 
And here Colthurst's underlying fatalism became of signal 
service to him once more. It enabled him to retain his 
mental equilibrium in respect of the issues raised by those 
cardinal points, it enabled him to 1 stay put ’ in respect of 
the future. For, after all, what is to be, must be ; you 
can no more hurry Destiny than you can delay her. One 
is always in plenty of time, dawdle as one may, for the 
Inevitable; that is a train one is perfectly safe to catch. 
So Colthurst just sat down under his present suspense in 
grim patience, determined to await the event — not to act, 
as far as might be not even to think. But this Spartan- 
like resolution was by no means calculated to soothe an 
irritable temper; and so his near neighbourhood was 
certainly to be avoided rather than courted, during that 
week, by any anxious to keep whole the skin of their 
self-conceit. 

Work is about the best anodyne for the dull ache of 
suspense, and Colthurst worked like a horse. Not con- 
tent with the pictures he had in hand and the daily 
routine of the school, he took to attending the evening 
classes for male students usually carried on under the 
mild auspices of Mr. Barwell. And he dropped in to one 
of the said classes for an hour one night on his way to 
a * small and early' dance at the Frank Lorimers'. Colt- 
hurst was not very much in the humour, as can easily be 
credited, to go and make sport for the social philistines ; 
moreover his enthusiasm for his prospective host and 
hostess was always of the slightest. Mrs. Frank's pretty 
little person and shrewd, self-sphered, impenetrable little 


Satan as an Angel of Light . 


3 67 


nature vexed him. He knew she regarded him very 
much as a bull in a china-shop ; and, by natural fatality, in 
her presence, something of a bull in a china-shop he only 
too frequently became. Still, the Lorimers were friends 
of Miss Crook enden ; and Colthurst’s Spartanism did not 
carry him so far as to prevent his being willing enough 
to embrace any opportunity of hearing news of that 
young lady which might present itself. So he went into 
the school duly arrayed for the festivity ahead; though all 
the same the prospect of the said festivity was so little 
alluring that his tongue and temper were highly* dis- 
tinguished for the reverse of suavity during that evening 
class. The students heard him close the door of the 
theatre with relief. Even Mr. Barwell had been somewhat 
mauled ; and now the good man followed him, along the 
flagged passage and up the stone stairs, very much in the 
spirit in which a faithful dog, that has endured an unjust 
beating, trots sadly reflective at his master’s heels. 

‘ It’s p-positively disgusting/ Colthurst was saying, as 
he reached the top of the flight ; ‘ they haven’t an ounce 
of imagination b-between them, I believe. B-but I could 
forgive that. P-people aren’t responsible for being born 
fools. What I can’t forgive is their want of application.' 

As he crossed the hall the porter put a note into his 
hand. 

‘ It was sent on from your rooms, sir/ he said. 1 They 
said the person who brought it begged you might have it 
at once/ 

Colthurst took the note mechanically, and went on to 
the office. 

1 In that, I must say, the female students, notwithstand- 
ing their affectations, are a lot the pleasantest to deal with 
of the two. Even the stupid ones have the merit of being 
more or less in earnest/ 

He moved across to the gas-jet over the office table and 
held the note up to the light. The address was in pencil. 
It was in Jenny Parris’s not very scholarly handwriting. 
It was something new for Jenny to send him notes. 
The hard line cut itself deep across Colthurst’s forehead. 
What the devil did she want ? 

* I suppose we may hope to see one of our most earnest 


368 


The Wages of Sin . 


young ladies back again before very long, at this rate/ 
Mr. Barwell observed mildly. 

He clasped his lean hands under his coat-tails, and 
rested his back against the wall. The under-master was 
rather done up, rather hurt ; yet still, in his amiable way, 
he made an effort to give the talk a less growling tone. 

I She threw us over for matrimony ; but now, if report 
speaks truly, she has thrown over matrimony in its turn. 
So we may hope she will return to her first love. 1 

Colthurst stripped the envelope off the note, and turned 
up the gas, which hissed and spluttered for a moment. 
Jenny’s writing was almost illegible. 

Meantime Mr. Barwell continued his small remarks. 

I I shall be glad if she does return, for she was dis- 
tinctly one of our best workers ; and a young lady of her 
standing helps to keep up the tone among our students. 
And then too ’ — he added, 1 I’m an old fellow, so there’s 
no harm I think in my saying it — it cheers one and does 
one good to see so charming a sight as she is sometimes.’ 

The under-master shifted his long back into an easier 
position against the wall, smiled and then sighed in- 
voluntarily. Even his gentle unexacting nature rebelled 
somewhat against the on-coming of Old Age, its depriva- 
tions, humiliations, disabilities. For him life had had no 
splendid, no tremendous hours. It had just been a steady 
piece of collar work along an extremely ordinary road. 
His share in the romance of the worship of art had been 
confined to sweeping down the steps of the temple, and 
teaching novices their a, b, c. The making of music 
within, the celebrating of the mass, had been for others. 
And now Old Age laid its hand on him, and whispered 
that even sweeping the temple steps, even teaching lazy 
scholars the rudiments, would soon be better done by 
younger men. Colthurst had confirmed that whisper 
to-night, in the drawing theatre ; had hinted, in a moment 
of irritation, he was getting past his work. The good man 
was sore. 

1 Yes, selfishly, I hope she’ll come back here,’ he said ; 
' for I should derive my own private modicum of pleasure 
from the return of Miss Crookenden.’ 

To the first part of this little discourse Colthurst had 


Satan as an Angel of Light. 


369 


not been attending; but at the last few words he was 
round with a sort of flash, while the ill-written, crumpled 
sheet of note-paper fluttered down to the floor. 

1 M-Miss Crookenden coming back here ? What d-do 
you know about her coming back ? ’ he stammered. 

* Oh ! I have no authority for asserting that she will 
return here/ Mr. Barwell answered, a good deal flurried 
by this unexpected display of fireworks right in the 
middle of his sentimental reflections. * Only, as I learn 
she has broken off her engagement, it struck me as not 
improbable — ' 

Colthurst could not restrain himself. * W-where aid 
you learn that ? ' he demanded. 

‘ From yesterday's paper — the Morning Post / Mr. 
Barwell said, not without a touch of dignity. He re- 
sented — really he could not help resenting — this very 
abrupt and hectoring form of address. ‘ My sisters 
happened to see the paper at a friend's house, and having 
heard me speak of Miss Crookenden they informed me of 
the announcement.' 

‘ I beg your pardon for cross-questioning you ' — Colt- 
hurst made a strong effort to subdue his excitement — 
1 b-but I had not heard the news. I know Mr. Aldham, 
and so it has a special interest for me. What exactly was 
the announcement ? ' 

‘ That the marriage arranged between — I forget the 
gentleman's name — Oldham — Aldham, yes, Aldham you 
said — and Miss Crookenden would not take place. That 
was the wording as reported to me.' 

Mr. Barwell left the kindly support of the office wall, 
went towards the door with his shuffling walk. Colthurst's 
small apology had mollified him, gone far to restore his 
momentarily wavering allegiance ; but the hand of Old 
Age pressed upon him, there was no question about that. 
He grew so fatigued of night now — quite longed for the 
repose of the semi-detached villa and affectionate minis- 
trations of the gentle parrot-nosed sisters at Hampstead. 

‘ Well, good night, Mr. Colthurst,’ he said. ‘ I hope 
you will enjoy an agreeable evening. I must go down to 
those idle young gentlemen of ours. I suppose we shall 
welcome you at the accustomed hour in the morning.’ 


370 


The Wages of Sin . 


Of c-course — yes — good-night/ Colthurst answered 
absently. 

Me sat down at the office table, rested his elbows on it, 
-caned his head in his hands. For a good twenty minutes 
he remained peacefully in that attitude. Through the 
prosaic medium of a daily paper Mary Crookenden had 
informed all whom it might concern that her proposed 
marriage was broken off. She had probably done this to 
put a stop both to congratulatory letters and speeches, 
and to the arrival of wedding presents. The reason 
mattered little enough to Colthurst, it was the fact he 
hailed, just the bare, simple fact. It quieted him as opium 
quiets. For the time it filled him with a rapturous calm, in 
Vhich all his faculties rested in a state of enchanted 
inactivity. The fact was enough in and by itself as yet. 

But the western mind cannot long remain in this con- 
dition of trance-like beatitude, thanks to the vexatious 
impatience of the western body. Downstairs the model 
was leaving ; and a confused noise of talk and movement 
in the theatre marked the breaking up of the evening 
class. Colthurst rose to his feet, stretched himself, took a 
long breath. Outside the soft brooding twilight lingered 
even yet. He thought he would wait until the students 
had departed, — Mrs. Frank Lorimer’s 1 small and early ’ 
was out of the question now, an insult to taste and in- 
telligence — and then he would go out and walk. Walk, 
it didn't much matter where. Walk, till the brief obscurity 
of the summer night melted into the fair summer dawn, 
and to-morrow awoke and climbed up the rosy eastern 
sky. 1 Beloved to-morrow * as it seemed to Colthurst just 
then — though precisely what he counted on to-morrow 
bringing him, he was, at present, too content to care to 
ask. 

Crossing the office to fetch his hat and overcoat, his 
foot slipped slightly on a piece of paper. Colthurst 
Stooped and picked it up ; and with a quick, sickening re- 
vulsion of feeling saw and remembered Jenny Parris' 
note. He hesitated a minute, then went back under a 
gas-jet to read it. 

' I would not ask you for myself/ it ran, * after 
what’s past, but Dot’s ill and goes on mourning for you 


Satan as an Angel of Light 


37i 


all the while ; she's your own child, you know, Jim, and 
the doctor says it’s a question if she lasts over the night 
like she is now/ 

What ! are you turned jade and hussy all of a sudden, 
* beloved to-morrow/ lifting your veil thus before the time 
and showing a glimpse of something singularly unlovely 
lying in your lap? Colthurst put on his hat and overcoat, set 
out on his walk. Not to some opium-eater's fine-fanciful 
love paradise, but down St. Martin's Lane, through West- 
minster, on by dreary shabby-genteel street after street 
south-westward to Delamere Crescent. 


Chapter IV. 

Jenny Parris was at her best in illness, unselfish, patient, 
self-forgetful. 

‘ Drink it down like a good little maid,' she was saying 
as Colthurst came in, and her voice was sweet with a 
sober, motherly tenderness. 

But the lodging-house sitting-room looked even less 
attractive than usual, — the table in the middle of it 
cluttered up with medicine bottles, a finger bowl of rapidly 
melting ice, a half emptied tin of jelly, a basin of toilet 
vinegar and water, the cleanly scent of which struggled 
but unsuccessfully against the tainted air of the room. 
Jenny's gown had been flung down, anyhow, upon the 
arm-chair by the fire-place ; while she, arrayed in a black 
alpaca petticoat and pink flannel jacket (very much past 
its first youth) sat, a fine unself-consciousness and absorp- 
tion in her whole attitude, leaning over the horse-hair sofa 
on which Dot lay. The neck of the little girl's night-gown 
gaped open, showing her flat childish bosom ; her back 
was propped up with bed-pillows ; and a Mexican blanket, 
once white with a magenta and black border and centre 
piece to it, now of somewhat indiscriminate hue, was 
wrapped about her feet and legs. Steve Kingdon had 
brought that blanket home to his sweetheart long ago, 
from Manzanillo on the Pacific Coast. And Colthurst 


372 


The Wages of Sin. 


loathed it with a consummate loathing ; for it had been 
the most substantial, at last the only, covering of his own 
sick bed during that waking night-mare of a time in the 
garret of the Hotel Garni in Paris, now just four years 
back. 

* Drink it down like a good little maid/ Jenny repeated. 

And Mrs. Prust, standing at the foot of the couch, all 
kindly, blinking, fussy solicitude, echoed the refrain. 

‘ Yes, take it all down, there’s a pretty dear. Captain 
Prust ’ull be as pleased as never was to hear Dot's took 
her physic like a sensible, good child.’ 

But poor Dot was not more amenable in sickness than 
in health. She tossed her head to and fro with the rest- 
lessness of semi- delirium. Her eyes were closed, her 
usually pale cheeks all of a flame, and her lips almost black. 

1 1 don’t want no nasty old medicine/ she fretted, * I 
want to go away. I want to go where it’s pretty. Every- 
thing’s so poky here. I want Mr. Snell to come and take 
me to see the ladies dance. Where’s Jim ? Why don’t 
you fetch him, Mammy ? I tell you I wants Jim.’ 

Mrs. Prust pursed up her mouth and shook her head, 
until the chenille blossoms decorating her cap vibrated 
wildly. Colthurst had entered the room very quietly, her 
attention was claimed by the child and her back was to- 
wards the door. So was Jenny’s for that matter. But 
she had no need to be told when Colthurst came into the 
house. She knew his step as he passed along the pave- 
ment, knew his ring at the bell ; felt his coming bodily, 
right through her, with a bitter, yet delicious spasm and 
stab. 

‘ Well, you can have what you want, then, that way/ 
she said, quietly ; ‘ Jim’s here.’ 

1 What, Mr. Colthurst — never/ the landlady cried, 
wheeling round. But she restrained further comments, 
congratulatory or the reverse, for in truth Colthurst’s 
present costume impressed her considerably. And, as 
she subsequently informed her master-mariner downstairs, 
though she ‘ didn’t hold with Mr. Colthurst’s goings on, 
and never had, she was bound to say, and if it was her 
last word on earth she’d say it, that he looked every inch 
a gentleman to-night and no mistake/ 


Satan as an Angel of Light. 


373 


Meanwhile Colthurst examined the sick child. 

I What’s the matter with her ?' he asked. 

‘ Typhoid fever/ Jenny said, over her shoulder without 
moving. ‘ She’s been awful bad this last week. Clean 
out of her head by times, telling all manner of fool- 
ishness/ 

Here Mrs. Prust found a dab absolutely irresistible. 

‘ And her poor mother all alone with her, night and 
day, till she’s properly wore out/ 

Colthurst glanced at the speaker not quite pleasantly. 

I I think we can dispense with your p-presence now, 
thank you, Mrs. Prust,’ he said. 1 1 p-propose remaining 
here to-night and helping to nurse Dot.’ 

Then he put aside his hat and overcoat, drew one of 
the shiny horse-hair chairs up beside the sofa, silently 
took the wineglass of medicine from Jenny. He slipped 
his left hand, out-stretched, under the nape of the child's 
neck and thin shoulders raising her slightly ; while, at his 
touch, she made a queer little croodling sound of comfort. 
Jenny Parris had known the calming, sustaining quality of 
that touch before now. She never expected to know it 
again. She had not seen Colthurst since the evening 
following her luckless visit to the Connop School, and she 
feared that that day’s work had made a breach between 
them past closing. And so hearing the child’s croodling 
cry, understanding just what it meant, poor Jenny began to 
feel a hungry jealousy all crossbarring her mother love. 
She watched, as a jealous person invariably watches 
eagerly that which most greatly inflames them, a dry light 
in her grey eyes. 

And through Colthurst too, that odd, half animal inti- 
mation of solace sent a rather painful thrill. Taken in 
connection with the sight of the old Mexican blanket, with 
the sight of Jenny’s handsome haggard face and untidy 
attire, taken in connection with the news of Mary 
Crookenden's broken engagement, it struck home, shook 
his nerve. A minute or more elapsed before he quite 
cared to trust himself to speak. 

* L-look here, Dot,’ he said at length, 1 1 have come and 
I’ll stay and help you to get well. B-but you must do as 
I tell you. You must drink this/ 


374 


The Wages of Sin. 


‘ I don’t want any more nasty old medicine/ and the 
child began to toss her head from side to side again. 1 1 
wants you to kiss me, Jim.’ 

A flush came over Colthurst’s dark skin. 

* Very well, I’ll kiss you, b-but only when you have 
d-drunk your medicine/ he said. 

She fretted feebly ; and, in Jenny Parris, witnessing her 
helpless suffering, jealousy died down and mother love 
once again rose paramount. 

* Poor little mortal, humour her, Jim. For God’s sake 
don’t teaze her any more. I can’t stand it.’ 

1 If I am to manage her at all, I must manage her in my 
own way/ Colthurst answered. He held the glass to the 
child’s mouth again. 1 D-drink it, Dot, and then I’ll kiss 
you.’ 

1 Oh ! you’m cruel hard/ Jenny cried. 

She got up hastily, went to the table, turning her back 
on him ; heard the little girl’s sobbing protest, the man’s 
unmoved insistence, then a gulping struggle to swallow on 
the part of Dot. Jenny pressed her clenched hands against 
her chest. It was just all she could do not to drag the 
glass away, not to make a scene with him. Yet when the 
gulping was over, and she, looking round, saw Colthurst 
kissing the child, her thin arms clinging about his neck, 
jealousy once more invaded Jenny Parris. She would 
have given her soul for a kiss just then, had such 
unholy bargain been feasible. 

* Oh ! nurse me, Jim ! ’ Dot moaned out, as he raised 
his head. *1 likes to be against you. Your clothes smell 
so lovely. — Mammy’s clothes always smells of nothing but 
the cupboard. And this nasty old sofa's so knobby. I 
can’t never go to sleep. And I'm so tired — so dreadful 
tired.’ 

When the wailing voice ceased Jenny stood for a moment 
motionless. Then she threw back her head with something 
of her old, generous, impulsive daring, and came across to 
the sofa again. 

* Take and nurse her, Jim/ she said, * there’s a good 
fellow. Sleep’s the thing to cure her if she’s to be cured. 
And you can put her to sleep if you’ve a mind to ; like you 
can do anything else when you’ve the mind.’ 


Satan as an Angel of Light. 


375 


She snatched up the Mexican blanket and arranged it over 
his right arm and his knees . — 1 That’s to save your lovely 
clothes/ she said, not without a dash of mockery. She 
stooped down, lifted the little girl, tenderly, skilfully, 
and placed her in Colthurst’s arms. Stooped lower 
and wraprped the loose end of the blanket about her 
feet. 

{ Put he to sleep, Jim/ she said, huskily. 1 Cure her. 
She’s a wicked little thing ; but she’s yours as well as mine, 
and she’s all of you I’ve got left — now.’ 

And Jenny went and flung herself down in the arm-chair 
by the fire-place. She kept her eyes fixed on Colthurst’s, 
profile, on his bent head, on the sweep of his broad 
shoulders, as he leaned a little forward cradling the child ; 
followed his every movement with insatiable attention, 
motionless, save now and then when a fit of coughing shook 
her, for Jenny's cough had been troublesome of late, and 
her handkerchiefs, too often, had come to be stained with 
blood. 

Colthurst, meanwhile, steeled himself against her scru- 
tiny, doing his best to concentrate all his thought upon the 
little girl, whose body, dry and burning from fever, felt like 
a hot plate lying across his knees. In his deft way he 
stripped up her night-gown sleeve, and began passing his 
finger tips softly round the palm of her hand, up as far as 
the hollow of her arm and down again to her wrist. But 
at first the mesmeric charm refused to work. To make it 
work, the operator needs a disengaged mind; and Colt- 
hurst’s mind was rather horribly preoccupied. For, after 
his absence of some weeks, the mean, littered room, all that 
it stood for, all that it implied, its tainted atmosphere, 
struck him with a freshness of repulsion, of remorse, of 
rage against himself, that he had gone and made this thing, 
this ugly cage as of unclean birds, wherein, from time to 
time, it was ordained his soul must come and sit. Even 
his natural pity for the sick child was doubled with a kind 
of spiritual disgust ; for he saw in her the poisonous fruit 
of his own sin— an evil deed taking on bodily form and 
confronting the doer of it as a material fact ; saw in her the 
incarnation of his own lust and Jenny’s ruin. 

And so, not unnaturally, at first he failed to soothe Dot. 


37<5 


The Wages of Sin. 


Every few minutes she opened her eyes and broke into 
rambling, disjointed talk. 

‘I wish you’d come and live along of us, Jim,’ she said, 
presently. ‘ It’s all so dull now you don’t never come. 
— What a lovely clean shirt you’ve got.’ 

And Dot wriggled her restless head about till her hot 
cheek rested against the cool, smooth surface of Colthurst’s 
shirt front. ' 

1 I love's you better ’n any one,’ she went on. 1 Much 
better ’n Mammy. Mammy’s always so mopey.’ 

The leather cover of the arm-chair creaked as Jenny 
shifted her position. 

I B-be quiet, Dot,’ Colthurst stammered. 

* Oh, let her talk. You needn’t be considerate of me. 
It’s a bit late for that. And I’m pretty well used to that 
sort of talk — hear it most days,’ Jenny said, recklessly ; 
and then the dragging cough took her. 

To Colthurst all this was inexpressibly painful. He 
could not sit still under it. He got up and began walking 
backwards and forwards the length of the two rooms, for 
the double doors were open into the bed-chamber, carrying 
the child in his arms. He hoped movement might serve 
to still Dot; but on went the relentless little voice. 

I I wish you’d come and live along of us,’ she repeated. 

‘ I wish you was my father.’ 

1 Hush, hush,’ said Colthurst. 

1 But I do. I loves you better’n anybody. And the 
children in the street throws it up against me I ain’t got 
no father.’ 

1 Do they ? The little devils ! ’ Colthurst murmured under 
his breath. He felt rather beside himself. 

Just then his walk brought him opposite to Jenny. She 
lay back in the arm-chair, exhausted by her fit of coughing. 
Her breathing was irregular and laboured. She pushed 
the dark masses of her hair up from her forehead and 
wiped her face round with a very shaky hand. The light 
from the gas over the table fell on her. She looked 
ghastly ; Colthurst seeing her softened somewhat. 

1 I’m afraid you’re ill again,’ he said. 

1 That’s an old tale,’ she answered, her lips parting in a 
half-defiant smile. 


Satan as an Angel of Light 


377 


' B-but have you seen a doctor ? Has he p-prescribed 
for you ? Have you taken what he ordered ? ’ Colthurst 
asked. 

' Doctor's stuffs not much use for my complaint.' — 
Jenny’s eyes met his, her smile sweetened, quivered, died. 
— 'The white witch over to Nettlecombe used to give the 
maids a draught to keep true love,’ she said, slowly ; 'and 
I’m thinking that’s the stuff as ’ud do me most good, Jim.’ 
— She wiped her face round again, and her voice grew as 
shaky as her hand. ' But up here in London they don’t 
know how to set about making medicine like that. They’re 
a deal too wide-awake to believe in such a pack of old 
foolishness, and so — ’ 

Her speech was interrupted by another fit of coughing. 
Colthurst walked on into the dusk of the unlighted bed- 
room, and sat down on the edge of the disordered, unmade 
bed. 

' Oh my God ! what must I do, what must I do ? ’ he said. 

Again he thought, and seriously, of the Registry Office ; 
but that, so it seemed to him, did not meet the require- 
ments of the case. It would cripple him, mutilate, and 
stultify the possibilities of his life, and yet fail to satisfy 
Jenny. For Jenny wanted not his name but his love. 
And that she should have his love was impossible, out of 
all nature and reason, they standing to each other in the 
relation in which they now stood. Colthurst, in his 
present extremity, could have resigned the hope of ever 
drawing nearer to Mary Crookenden ; but to resign it to 
no purpose — that seemed too much. Then Dot asserted 
the fact of her sad little existence once more. 

' I want to go away where it’s pretty,’ she repeated, 
fretfully. ' It’s all so ugly here, and the children's bad to 
me. — There’s children as wears lovely short frocks and 
sashes tied low down, and I’d like to play with — but they 
drives me away,’ — Dot’s fretting rose into crying — ' ’cause 
they says their mothers says Mammy’s a kept-woman, 
and so they mustn’t ’sociate along of me ; and their frocks 
is lovely — and they’ve got a doll's pr'am — and I wanls to 
play with ’em awful bad. Why’s Mammy like — ’ 

At first Colthurst had not been conscious of the drift of 
her talk, but he had gathered enough of it, and more than 


378 


The Wages of Sin . 


enough now. He laid his hand on the child's mouth, 
and, with a dislocating sensation of mingling pathos, 
shame, abhorrence, felt her parched lips kiss and re-kiss 
the palm of it. Verily this was a vile thing which he had 
made, a horrible place wherein his soul must come and sit ! 
For a moment his courage gave out. The skein seemed 
too tangled for any disentangling. The old longing took 
him for rest and peace and escape at any price. Then by 
one of those immense acts of will, in which the energy 
that should rightly go to cover some weeks of living is 
expended in a few seconds, he pulled himself together, 
got up, went back into the sitting-room again, placed him- 
self on the sofa, raised his hand from the child’s burning, 
kissing mouth, bent down over her, looked her in the 
eyes. 

* You shall go away, where it is p-pretty, go away for a 
long while,’ he said. 1 But to be able to go you must 
get well, and to get well you must sleep. Do you hear ? 
you are to sleep, Dot — to sleep — listen, to sleep.’ 

And once more he began stroking her wrist, his fingers 
moving slowly up to the hollow of her arm and down 
again ; with the result that as the heavy minutes passed 
she grew quieter, her eyelids drooped, closed, while her 
breathing became more' regular. 

But Jenny, unluckily, had misinterpreted Colthurst’s 
whole course of action, thought him callous, thought he 
had gone away into the bedroom to avoid her, thought he 
had returned now to show his indifference to her suffer- 
ing. And so, seeing him bend down and speak in that 
low whispering way of his to Dot, jealousy, rivalry of her 
own child again tore her. Yet, so strangely does mother- 
love overrule even the headiest passion, she waited until 
she believed Dot to be safely asleep, and then hardly 
spoke above her breath. 

1 You didn’t make yourself so smart just out of compli- 
ment to us, Jim, I reckon,' she said. ‘You go out most 
nights now to some grand doings or other, I expect. Fay ! 
I wouldn’t mind having a chance to go to some of ’em too. 
I’m like Dot, I want to go away where it’s pretty.’ — -Jenny 
rubbed back her rough hair, and her voice took that 
taunting ring again, — ‘ Suppose you tell about it all, Jim, 


Satan as an Angel of Light. 


379 


while we sit here so nice and quiet. It 'ud help to pass 
the time a bit. Where were you off to to-night ? ’ 

‘To Mrs. Frank Lorimer's dance/ he answered, 
succinctly. 

‘ I’m sorry we spoilt your pleasure by sending for you 
down to our poor place/ Jenny returned. ‘Seems quite 
a pity, doesn't it ? And who were you going to dance 
with ? ' 

Colthurst had been studying the magenta and black 
border of the Mexican blanket while Jenny was speaking. 
Her tone, the rasping incongruity of his whole position, 
maddened him. He turned wicked. 

‘ With no one/ he said. ‘ I d-don’t dance in these 
days, not even to a b-barrel organ on the doorstep, like 
my sweetly-brought-up little d-daughter here.' 

‘ Ah, that's a bad one/ Jenny cried out, sharply. And 
Colthurst was forced to own to himself it was an extremely 
bad one. But that was precisely why he dreaded and 
recoiled from this unhappy woman so. She had a fatal 
capacity of bringing out the very worst in him, of driving 
him to do and say all that was most repugnant to the 
finer taste and nobler nature in him. And it was just 
this capacity of Jenny's which in his opinion constituted 
her unpardonable offence. She had a demoralising effect 
upon him. It is comparatively easy, under certain condi- 
tions, to forgive our neighbour his own trespasses ; but it 
is well nigh impossible to forgive him the trespasses he 
makes us ourselves commit. 

But here Dot created a diversion, and this time a fortu- 
nate one. During the above conversation, low-toned 
though it was, she had become increasingly restless. Now 
her limbs twitched and started, and her eyelids opened 
partially, showing the whites of her eyes. 

‘ Oh ! I'm so thirsty, Mammy/ she moaned. ‘ I'm all 
like I was on fire inside of me. And the penny-ice man 
with the red and blue waggon's up along the street. Give 
me a penny, Mammy. — Oh ! he’s going, he’s going, why 
ever ain’t you quick ? ' 

At the first moaning cry Jenny was on her feet. She 
came across, knelt down in front of Colthurst, put a spoon- 
ful of Jelly to the child's mouth, 


380 


The Wages of Sin. 


* Poor little soul/ she said, softly, while with character- 
istic absence of ceremony she planted the jelly tin on 
Colthurst’ s knee. ‘ Catch hold of it, Jim. Perhaps she’ll 
take in a bit more if I try her ; and it’s the first mortal 
thing that's crossed her lips but a drop of water and the 
medicine you gave her these twelve hours.’ 

So there he sat, our man of genius, our devout lover of 
a pure maiden — and surely there was a good deal of 
heroism, a good deal of nobility, in the position ? holding 
the tin of jelly, holding Dot; Jenny kneeling before him, 
while the fronts of her old pink flannel jacket swept against 
him at every movement, her rough hair almost brushed his 
face, while patiently, tenderly, forgetting self, forgetting — 
harder thing by far to a woman — the close proximity of 
the man whom she adored — in obedience to the divinely 
excellent instinct of motherhood, she fed the sick child. 

In spite of himself, Colthurst was touched . — 1 Look here, 
Jenny,' he said, quietly, ‘I have no wish to quarrel with 
you and behave b-brutally to you. Your case is pretty 
hard, b-but, before God, mine isn’t much better. The 
principal difference is that your wretchedness has no lie 
in it, is all of a piece. Whereas mine has a showy outside 
to it — is a sepulchre, of which the world as a rule only 
sees the staring white-wash ; while I see, with an endless 
nausea, the dead men’s bones and all the uncleanness lying 
rotting within.’ 

* I don't want no more, Mammy/ and Dot turned away 
her head fretfully. 

Jenny stood up, took the tin from Colthurst, waited a 
moment looking down at him out of tragic grey eyes. 

* Let’s cry quits, for to-night at least, for the child’s 
sake/ he went on. * We brought her into the world to 
please ourselves, and were a pair of consummate fools for 
our pains ; but that’s neither here nor there. Now don’t 
let us risk adding murder to the old sin, by letting her slip 
out of it again while we are busy gratifying our very natural 
inclination for slanging each other. I can’t argue with you 
and soothe her to sleep both at once. B-be reasonable. 
Leave me alone. D-don’t badger me. You must see that 
lengthening the long score we have run up against each 
other won’t really do either of us the faintest good.'— 


Satan as an Angel of Light. 


38i 


His tone became less bitter . — 1 Go and lie down — get 
some rest. It is clear enough you need it ; and leave me in 
peace to do my best for the child/ 

It was past five, broad day, when at last Colthurst let 
himself out into the street ; the long, confused, distressful 
night was over, with all its warring emotions, its cruel 
strain and fret. The little girl lay sleeping on the bed in 
the back room. And Jenny slept too, in the arm-chair by 
the fire-place : her left arm raised, her hand under the back 
of her head, her full lips pouting, her forehead drawn into 
a frown beneath the unruly masses of her dark hair, while 
her bosom rose and fell in quick catching breaths. Large- 
limbed, statuesque even now, though wasted by disgrace, 
sorrow, and that dragging cough, she looked like some worn 
passion-torn Maenad, with — for the fashions of the ages 
change queerly — rusty black alpaca petticoat in place of 
fawn skin, and, clasped in her right hand for the thyrsus, 
the plated tea-spoon with which she had fed little Dot. 


Chapter V. 

Dot did not die. Such superfluous members of society 
rarely die somehow, but she had more than one bad re- 
lapse. Her illness was stubborn, it cost Colthurst time, 
thought, and money ; for he continued to do his duty by the 
child in a spirit of dogged patience. More than one night 
he sat up with her, and went away in the early summer 
mornings dazed and spent, to take up his day’s work at the 
Connop School. He led a curiously dual life during this 
illness of Dot’s, and he found it very distracting. Some- 
times when Jenny, over-wrought by anxiety and watching, 
losing sight of his present kindness in the memory of past 
wrongs done her, let loose her tongue upon him, Colthurst, 
to borrow his own rather violent phrase, had reason to 
congratulate himself on being in pandemonium well up to 
the neck. He had heard that Miss Crookenden had gone 
out of town. He knew no more than that ; and it seemed 
to him, under existing circumstances, there would be a cer- 


3§2 


The Wages of Sin . 


tain grossness in trying to find out more. All that must 
stand over for the present, probably stand over for ever. 
Residence in pandemonium does not tend to generate a 
hopeful frame of mind. 

Meanwhile, invitations continued to pour in upon Colt- 
hurst, for he remained very much the fashion during that 
season. His flavour was a pungent one, and therefore 
welcome to Society’s rather jaded palate. He was famous 
and consequently was feted . Pretty women petted him — 
or, to be accurate, did their best to pet him, for Colthurst 
was not an animal altogether easy to pet — and when he 
treated them to some rather blasting sentiment, pro- 
nounced him to be “ really most deliciously quaint.” All 
this caused him much bitter amusement, and his existence 
seemed to him most thoroughly of the sepulchre sort. 

And so time drew on until the summer term ended, and 
the Connop School closed for the vacation ; but Colthurst 
remained in London, waiting until Dot should be sufficiently 
convalescent to be sent off to the seaside with her mother. 
It was not until the first week in August that the child was 
strong enough to be moved. Colthurst went to Delamere 
Crescent on the morning of her departure ; saw her and 
Mrs. Prust and Jenny and a very miscellaneous assortment 
of luggage — a sea-chest, rickety band boxes, bulging 
brown paper parcels — bestowed within and upon a four- 
wheel cab en route for Waterloo. 

He watched the cab drive off — Dot putting her pale little 
face out. of window and kissing her hand effusively to him 
— with a dreary sense of accomplishment, of dull relief. 
This business was over for the present, any how, and he 
was thankful. But he had a feeling of utter depression 
upon him. It was over, but only to begin again later in 
some other form. He was not rid of it, only rid of a phase 
of it. And as Colthurst wandered away by the mean, 
shabby-genteel streets down to the Embankment, in a pur- 
poseless fashion very uncommon to him, he asked himself 
savagely whether the next phase might not be worse even 
than the last. 

The day was not calculated to dispel depression. It was 
overcast, colourless, while everything seemed coated by all- 
pervading dust. Even the river looked dusty, running low 


Satan as an Angel of Light. 


333 


and sluggish, fouled here and there by great floats of 
iridescent scum. In few places can you be more completely 
alone than in London in August. To Colthurst the solitude 
was not unwelcome. He had had only too constant com- 
panionship of a kind lately. The unwholesome moral and, 
indeed, physical atmosphere he had breathed, the conflict- 
ing emotions induced in him by Dot, the strain of con- 
stant intercourse with Jenny — of behaving decently to her 
yet keeping her at arm’s length — had told on him, for the 
moment had drained his vitality. He felt utterly empty, 
as though he had no volition, no power of recovery or re- 
bound left. He sat down on a bench facing the river, took 
off his hat, and stared aimlessly at the slow drifting 
scum. 

* I am regularly played out,’ he said. * Jenny and 
circumstances combined will be too much for me, after all. 
And the thing which rules this great lie of a world, God, 
devil, blind force or Fate — whichever it is — is unjust, un- 
just. It picks out a victim here and there at random, to 
make an example of, while it lets a score of others, whose 
crimes are just as black, get off scot free. And it has paid 
me the very left-handed compliment of picking me out, 
placing me among the examples. I have done no worse 
than numbers who marry and settle, as the phrase runs, 
and flourish like green bay trees and produce whole groves 
of legitimate small bay trees ; while scandal never raises a 
finger against them in the way of revelation of a doubtful 
past.’ 

Colthurst turned his head, looked along the bench. At 
the further end of it a man lay sleeping, his face pillowed 
on his folded arms. 

1 Yes, the thing is unjust,’ he repeated, ‘ unjust. You 
and your next-door neighbour are guilty of precisely the 
same lapse. To him, in the long run, it makes not a 
fraction of difference, while you are hounded to death.’ 

He gazed sullenly at the man lying along the bench, a 
disreputable figure dressed in what had once been good 
clothes — that sorriest of garments a seedy frock coat — 
the leg of one trouser, moreover, hitched up, showing that 
he wore no socks, had nothing on his feet save a pair of 
cracked and dusty old patent-leather boots. Colthurst, 


384 


The Wages of Sin. 


observing him, was affected by a despairing sense of 
brotherhood. 

1 There is another victim/ he said. * Another poor wretch 
made an example of — hung up like a crow by one wing in 
a cornfield to warn other crows of filling their crops with 
forbidden pleasures.’ 

He looked back at the floating scum. 

‘ By heaven, I should be glad to know how low it is 
the intention of the Thing which made me that I am to 
fall ? Am I ordained to sink and sink, till I too come to 
lie on a bench in broad day on my stomach, in the few 
clothes I have saved from the pawn shop, and drown the 
shame of a great failure in sottish sleep ? ’ 

Colthurst got up. 

1 There’s always one remedy in reserve/ he said. 
* Nothing can deprive one of that, but want of pluck ; and 
so far whatever I have lacked I haven’t lacked pluck, I think.’ 

He went on, the same drained dead-alive feeling upon 
him. It was an ill-starred morning, whatever was 
grotesque and unsightly appeared to have come forth to 
display itself. All the cripples seemed to be out and about, 
all the slatternly women and girls, the tails of whose 
tattered skirts lick up the refuse of the pavement ; all the 
underfed, scrofulous children ; all the broken-winded, 
spavined horses. And everywhere, on everything, thick 
and choking lay the penetrating London dust. He turned 
off the Embankment just short of Battersea Bridge into the 
wider and more fashionable streets. But the dust was 
there too. The houses were .blank and silent, blinds and 
shutters closed, plants withering neglected in window- 
boxes ; the road-ways vacant, arid, desolate. Lamentable 
sights claimed Colthurst’s attention here also; at last, 
among others, the very lamentable though very common 
sight of a cat playing with a wounded mouse. 

When he first remarked the creature, she was per- 
fectly quiet, save for the tip of her tail softly lashing the 
grey flags ; while the mouse deluded by her quietness, 
crawled from between her outstretched paws to reach 
imaginary shelter in the gutter under the edge of the kerb 
stone. For a second or two the cat let the fugitive be ; 
rolled over and over in rather diabolical gaiety, with those 


Satan as an Angel oj Light. 


335 


queer feline chucklings of enjoyment that it is quite the 
reverse of comfortable to hear. Then she found her feet, 
leapt lightly after the mouse which had just gained the 
gutter. And Colthurst, though by no means the most 
sentimentally soft-hearted of men, turned sick, as he saw 
the poor little beast sit up on end, squeaking thinly sharp 
as a slate pencil squeaks when you draw it upright across a 
slate, and strike out right and left at the cat’s great, grin- 
ning, whiskered face with its tiny fragile-fingered paws. 

Colthurst felt mad against the cat, forgetting that, as 
cats go, she was really quite within her rights, for in 
her dealings with the mouse he read a rather ghastly 
parable. So he struck at her too, tried to drive her off; 
but she proved too quick for him, nipped up the shrieking 
mouse in her white teeth, and bounded away across the 
road and down between the area railings of a house oppo- 
site. Colthurst followed her, a singular necessity upon 
him to witness the end of the tragedy, and as he did so 
the aspect of the house in question arrested his attention. 
It was painted pale blue, its window-boxes were fresh, 
still charming with flowers, the dust seemed to have found 
no lodging-place upon it or them. With a sensation at 
once happy and sinister, Colthurst perceived it was Mary 
Crookenden’s house — the house he had once visited, and 
from which he had been ejected rather ingloriously, thanks 
to Madame Jacobini’s liberal use of the snuffers. 

For some minutes he paused in the middle of the silent 
roadway. This morning he had reached the bottom of 
his great discontent ; now the reaction came, as in such 
a nature it was bound to come. For the rage of living 
had suffered but temporary abatement in Colthurst. He 
shook himself queerly as though actually to shake off and 
rid himself of the lethargy that held him. 

1 After all/ he said, ‘a mouse, here and there, must 
make good its escape. Perhaps, after all, Fate has not 
loaded the dice. I will try one throw more, for the 
chance of salvation through the love of a pure woman. 
Injustice may go far, but it can hardly dare strike her to 
compass my punishment. That would be too flagrant.’ 

And then, thinking of Mary Crookenden, Colthurst’s 
flesh cried out for her; and not his flesh only — for Satan 


336 


The Wages of Sin. 


tempting him had at least the grace to tempt him through 
the nobler as well as the baser side of his nature — all that 
which was spiritual in him, ambitious of what is lovely 
and of good report, cried out for her too. He went 
across the dusty road, a tremendous revulsion of feeling 
upon him. Rang, enquired for her, learnt she had rented 
a cottage down in Surrey for the summer. 

Colthurst took the first hansom he could find and rattled 
down to Waterloo. He would go and see Mary Crooken- 
den ; ask her to be his saviour, ask her to be his wife. 
He told himself he had been scrupulous to the point of 
mania. He must have her ; for she only could save him, 
save in the truest and deepest sense, his life. 

Out in the country there was sunshine, a rich profound 
green of woods, and gold of corn-lands. Out in the country 
there were no grotesque and sinister sights, no clinging, 
choking soil of dust. As the train whirled away through 
the sunny landscape, Colthurst was filled by a glorious 
renewal of hope. And yet he remembered, though he 
fought against the remembrance, how, while he stood on 
Miss Crookenden’s doorstep, he had heard the cat growl- 
ing to herself down in the area as she crunched up the 
mouse. 


Chapter VI. 

Do you know what it is to love and be loved ? Do you 
know — not by hearsay merely, but by experience — this 
absorption of the life of one human being in another, the 
one man in the one woman, the one woman in the one 
man ? For the time they, each to each, alike the centre 
and the sum, the very end and purpose of creation ; the 
rest vague, phantasmal, — they, each to each, the only 
abiding reality. For the time they, each through the 
other, possessors and interpreters of all things; this 
immense universe a setting merely, the sights and sounds, 
the glory and wonder of it, but ministers to their delight 
in one another. For them stars rise and set, and the 
wheat waves under the summer wind. For them the sea 


Satan as an Angel o] Light. 


3 %7 


grows white westward, at evening, meeting the sky in 
long embrace. For them all fair pictures are painted; all 
songs sung; and even common things become instinct 
with a strange sacramental grace. For them the oracles 
are no longer dumb, the mysteries lie open, they walk 
with the gods. 

This is the crown and triumph of the riddle of sex; 
wherein, for the time, the long torment, shame and 
anguish of it is forgotten, so that man’s curse becomes, 
for the time, his most exquisite blessing — a blessing in 
which body and spirit equally participate. Whether, 
rightly considered, we here touch divinest revelation or 
most malign illusion, who shall say ? But, for the time, 
that is a detail ; for the illusion, if illusion it be, is com- 
plete 

Colthurst lay — not on his stomach on a dusty London 
bench — but on his back in the springy heather, his hands 
clasped under his head, looking up at the mackerel sky. 
Somewhere far away in the depth of the wood, a wood- 
pigeon cooed, cooed— most reposeful of natural sounds. 
And now and again a draught of air hushed through the 
fir-trees, and stirred the delicate foliage of the birches 
fringing the edge of the plantation. Mary Crookenden 
sat very still, her feet crossed, her hands in her 
lap. A long slanting ray of sunlight, from between 
the ruddy trunks of the firs crowning the ridge behind 
her, gilded the shadowed brightness of her hair. In the 
hollow, some few yards below, was a shallow moorland 
pond. And her eyes, fixed on the smooth surface of the 
clear brown water, were lustrous, serious, with a great 
content. 

For this was one of those good hours when love grows 
perfect to the casting out of fear. She had no dread of 
the man lying there on the heath beside her. His 
strength no longer oppressed her as it formerly had done. 
It seemed to buoy her up, she rejoiced in it. Just now 
the troubles that her choice involved, the opposition of rela- 
tions, the possible severance of old friendships, her Aunt 
Caroline’s inevitable anger, Lancelot’s inevitable distress, 
all the talk that the announcement of this new engagement 
following so hard on the heels of that other broken one 

C C 2 


388 


The Wages of Sin. 


necessarily provoked — these were forgotten. Only the 
mellow serenity of the September evening, the magical 
charm that haunted the still woods, the dry warmth of the 
light moorland air, the sense of the man’s great love en- 
circling, upholding her, remained. And that love now 
was not fettering, constraining, impeding; for she had 
yielded herself up to it with a fulness which had converted 
it from bondage to freedom. Mary Crookenden had never 
been more self-secure, more serenely proud in the days 
of her loneliness than now when she had given her heart 
irrevocably into another’s keeping. 

A couple of big red dragon-flies flashed hither and 
thither over the little brown pond, on the smooth surface of 
which the blue sky, dappled with cloud, was reflected. A 
swarm of gnats danced upward, in a tall, shifting sunny 
pillar. A sighing passed through the upper branches of 
the Scotch-firs. The wood-pigeon ceased cooing. Mary 
turned sideways, rested her right hand on the heath just 
beyond Colthurst’s shoulder, leaned right across between 
him and the sky, looked down at him with triumphant 
fearlessness. 

1 Are you happy ? ’ she asked. 

‘ Divinely/ Colthurst answered. 

1 Are you satisfied ? * 

1 Almost/ he said. 

The girl bent her beautiful head and kissed him, smil- 
ing with a certain gentle gravity. 

1 Now are you satisfied ? ’ 

* Ah ! my beloved, my beloved/ Colthurst murmured. 
' Ah ! my beloved, — your face and behind it the eternity 
of that blue sky. — No, there are only two more things to 
ask for — the day and night that make you my wife, 
and then — then if it might be — last and best gift of God, 
d-death, “ delicate death.”' 

Mary drew back. 

1 Then you’re not happy after all/ she said. 1 For the 
last thing one asks being happy, is to die.’ 

( I d-don't know about that/ Colthurst said. 

* But you must be happy/ the girl insisted. ‘ What 
more can I do to make you so ? * 

i N-nothing, except never change, never love me less.’ 


Satan as an Angel of Light. 


389 

There was a silence before Mary spoke. Her eyes 
were on the quiet little brown pond, and again from the 
heart of the wood came the soft cooing note of the pigeon. 

‘ 1 can never love you less, because to me you and love 
are one and the same.’ The girl's face flushed. ‘ 1 can’t 
think of it apart from you, or you apart from it/ she said. 

Colthurst raised himself on his elbow; and, while he 
looked up at her, for one of the first and last times in his 
life his eyes filled with tears. 

‘And yet/ he said presently, stammering suddenly — 
‘yet I am not the m-man you ought to have loved, 
whom you ought to marry. Sometimes, even now, I 
have a hideous d-dread that you have stepped off the 
right lines of your nature, that you will find out that you 
have suffered a d-delusion, and then — then ' — Colthurst 
laid his hand on her knee — ‘ my p-precious one, are you 
sure you've counted the cost ? ’ 

‘ There is no cost, now/ the girl said. 

‘ Not here and to-day, perhaps, but later ? You may 
come to hear things about me. P-people may tell you 
ugly stories.' 

‘ I shall not believe them/ 

‘ But I have lived hard/ Colthurst went on. ‘ It's 
true. I have got scars, n-nasty scars. As time goes on 
you may happen to see them, they’ll shock you, disgust 
you perhaps.’ 

Mary shook her head, still looking at the bright shifting 
pillar of dancing gnats. 

‘ B-but they are not honourable scars, many of them. 

I got them fighting in no particularly glorious battles.' 

Colthurst stretched his hand further, laid it on her 
hands as they rested on her lap. 

‘ You m-must understand now — it is right you should 
understand, though it is dreadful to me to tell you. B-be- 
fore 1 knew you, I was vicious, I was p-profligate. I never 
d-drank, but only because drink never happened to tempt 
me. And I never scamped my work either, b-because 
till I knew you it was the only thing I really loved. 
But the sins that did tempt me, I committed. And 
sometimes the remembrance of them rise up hot in 
me, and defiles all the present. And then I feel guilty 


39 ° 


The Wages of Sin. 


of sacrilege in b-being near you, in touching you, in 
letting you kiss me as —bless you for doing it — you kissed 
me just now.’ 

Colthurst’s hand closed down on hers, gripping them 
until he almost pained her. 

* You have r-raised me/ he said. 1 You have brought my 
whole life up to a higher level. B-but still the Ethiopian 
can’t change his skin or the leopard its spots. I shall do 
and say that at times, however careful I am, which 
must be displeasing to you, which must offend your 
taste.’ 

His grip on her hands tightened. A strong desire was 
upon him, it had grown and grown during the past month 
of close intercourse — to make a clean breast of it and tell 
her all; for the more he delighted in her the more he 
recoiled from dealing dishonestly with her. And yet how 
was it possible, plainly and positively, to tell her this 
thing ? 

* I have been penniless, and that leaves a scar, leaves 
an abiding distrust of the good faith of fortune, even when 
she comes to one, as she has come to me lately, all 
b-broad smiles, and her lap full of gifts. I have starved.’ 

* Ah 1 ’ cried the girl, with a little movement towards 
him. 

Colthurst smiled at her. Her pity was very lovely. 
But he went on. 

1 Yes, it is not agreeable to starve. That leaves a scar 
too. It makes you envious, makes you cruel, makes you 
feel murderously towards your well-fed fellow-creatures.' 
He paused a moment . — ‘ I have herded with outcasts. 
Have been dependent — God forgive me, for I didn’t know 
where the cursed money came from then — upon the 
earnings of a common ’ 

But Mary, almost violently, drew her hands away. 

1 You hurt me,’ she said. 

She rose to her feet, moved slowly down over the 
carpet of purple heather, and stood, a tall, slim, stately 
young figure, on the shore of the little pond. Then Colt- 
hurst’s purpose melted into thin air. For all his life, all 
the worth and purpose of it was bound up with this 
woman ; he clung to her as the devotee clings to his god. 


Satan as an Angel of Light. 


39i 


There was an almost superstitious element in his love; 
even momentary alienation such as this gave him a sense 
of despair. Surely, he reasoned, things having gone thus 
far, his first duty now lay in preserving her peace of mind ? 
Surely the burden of self-accusation, the burden of dis- 
closure, was lifted off him if she thus refused to hear ? 
He waited a minute watching her, undecided. The gnats 
danced on and the pigeon cooed; and the light became 
more ruddily golden as the sun sunk behind the firs, making 
their branches glow like living flame. Then he went 
down and stood near her beside the little pond. And out 
of the clear brown water her face looked up at him pale, 
questioning, sad. Colthurst was cut to the heart. 

1 I’m a b-brute,’ he said, in that quick, urgent, whisper- 
ing way of his, 1 a selfish brute to have troubled your 
sweet soul with the story of my bad days. Thanks to 
you, those b-bad days are over, for-*-for ever. We will 
b-blot them out of remembrance ; from now they shall be 
as though they were not, never had been. Forget all I 
was mad enough to say, put it away from you. And for- 
give me, Mary, as you love me — if, indeed, you do love 
me— forgive me. Trust me, my darling, I will never pain 
you like this again.’ 

Colthurst stretched out his arms to the fair image in 
the water ; and as he did so, the face looking up at him 
lost its sadness, began to smile with a certain grave 
tenderness. 

I My b-beloved,’ he stammered, greatly moved, i my 
beloved.’ 

Just then a ripple passed across the surface of the pond, 
breaking and distorting the reflection ; but that was of 
slight moment to Colthurst, for he held the woman herself 
in his arms. Her head was on his shoulder, her heart 
beat against his heart. 

I I do love you,’ she said, 1 1 can’t help myself. I don’t 
want to help myself. Whatever you may have done, 
whatever has happened to you — I can’t help myself— it 
makes no difference. Only please don’t tell me, that can 
do no good, and — I’m cowardly — I’d rather not know.’ 

And Colthurst put his hand on her white throat as her 
head lay back on his shoulder and swore a great oath she 


392 


The Wages of Sin. 


should never know. To save her from that foul knowledge 
he would lie, and if needs be do worse than lie. For his 
passion made him wholly unscrupulous just then, reckless, 
blind to all obligation, but the one of sheltering her. And 
he hated Jenny Parris, hated the thought of her, hated the 
fact of her existence, with a consuming hatred. For her, 
crossing Mary Crookenden's happiness, he had no mercy. 
She must be obliterated, and, along with remembrance of 
his old bad days, utterly blotted out. 

Half way home, on the edge of the great common — 
where the moorland ends and civilisation and its restraints 
in the shape of banks, and lanes, and high-roads begin — 
Colthurst stopped. Critical common-sense as represented 
by Madame Jacobini was waiting, as he only too fully 
realized along with other restraints of civilisation, just 
ahead. He looked at the young girl earnestly, almost 
fiercely through the* dimness of the mellow September 
dusk. 

' You are satisfied ? * he asked in his turn. ' You have 
no regrets ? ' 

Mary shook her head. 'Now, none/ she said. 

'Now, yes. But to-morrow, next day ? 1 Colthurst 
demanded. 

Mary glanced round. They were alone, but for the long 
dark stretches of the moorland, the churring of the night- 
jar, the round-headed oak trees in the hedge. And, so 
thoroughly had the great god Love taught our proud, 
milk-white maiden his strange lesson, that she took Colt- 
hurst’s face in both hands, drew it down, kissed him once 
again on the lips. 

' For those who love as we do, as long as they are 
together it is always now/ she said. ' So that to-morrow 
and the day after matter not one little bit. Only don't 
ask to die, my dearest, just as you are making me under- 
stand all that it may be to live.* 


The Wages are Paid. 


393 


BOOK VII.— THE WAGES ARE PAID. 

* Sail forth— steer for the deep waters only, 

Reckless O soul, exploring, I with thee and thou with me ; 

For we are bound where mariner has not yet dared to go, 

And we risk the ship, ourselves and all.’— Walt Whitman. 

Chapter I. 

The philosophy of the point of view is a great and illumi- 
nating-philosophy ; but it tends somewhat to the promotion 
of pessimism, showing, as it does, the permanent and sur- 
prisingly great gulf fixed between one human mind and 
another. For instance, while James Colthurst and Mary 
were thus interpreting creation by means of their love for 
one another, that love struck some persons as an anything 
but desirable piece of business. 

Mrs. Crookenden settled her large shoulders back in her 
wicker chair, planted on the gravel just outside the Sierra- 
combe greenhouse, and addressed her brother-in-law in 
tones of profound displeasure. 

1 My dear Kent/ she said, 1 it is useless to attempt to 
explain away the disagreeables of this new departure on 
poor Mary’s part. This is the climax of a long course of — 
you must excuse my saying so plainly — most extraordinary 
and inconsiderate conduct ; and shows a most lamentable 
disregard of other people’s feelings.’ 

Mrs. Crookenden folded her hands, with their array of 
handsome rings, over her crochet, and drew her chin in. 

1 It is most unbecoming, most unbecoming.’ 

The Rector was in low spirits. His tongue had lost the 
keenness of its edge. And he found nothing better to 
reply than — * Well, if she is making a mistake, poor child, 
she will be chief sufferer by it, in any case.' 

Mrs. Crookenden, gratified by this indirect concession, 
picked up her crochet again, and continued calmly : — 


394 


The Wages of Sin. 


1 Breaking off her engagement to Mr. Aldham was bad 
enough, caused discomfort and annoyance enough, I am 
sure. Poor dear Miss Aldham can’t get over it. It is quite 
sad to see her. And most awkward for me. She sent for 
me the other day, and, I'm sure, I did not know what to say. 
You see the engagement had been made so very public, he 
had gone about with Mary so much. Everyone knew about 
it. I consider her behaviour perfectly unpardonable.’ 

‘ You would have preferred her marrying Aldham and 
being more or less miserable ? ’ the Rector inquired. 

* If she was miserable it would have been entirely her 
own fault. She would have had an excellent position. 
Mr. Aldham is a most thorough gentleman. I really don’t 
know what right Mary has to ask more than that. Most 
girls in her circumstances would be only too thankful to 
make such a good marriage. Mary has a most undue 
opinion of her own importance, I am afraid,’ — Mrs. Crook- 
enden folded her hands again , — * but then she has been 
spoilt, dreadfully spoilt.’ 

The Rector drew little patterns, crosses and squares and 
intersecting circles, upon the gray shingly gravel with the 
point of his walking-stick. 

* Yes, perhaps I have been to blame,’ he said, quietly. 
‘ There’s no fool like an old fool, you know, Caroline. Very 
likely I have done Mary more than one ill-service, fancied 
I was going the way to make her young life pleasant when 
I was really only pampering myself.’ — His mouth twitched 
into a rather harsh smile . — ‘ More than half the love for 
our friends and neighbours on which we plume ourselves 
so much, proves to be nothing better than self-love when 
we run it to earth. Egotism is a slippery customer, difficult 
to catch, it doubles and turns like a hare.’ 

Mrs. Crookenden congratulated herself, she really found 
her brother-in-law surprisingly reasonable and amenable 
this afternoon. And this praiseworthy frame of mind of 
his raised her hopes ; for Mrs. Crookenden once having 
conceived a purpose did not easily relinquish it. Placid- 
natured people are usually obstinate. All through these 
years she had clung to her original scheme for the disposal 
of the Rector’s hand and heart. Lady Dorothy Hellard 
still unmated, continued to trot after her very tough old 


The Wages are Paid. 


395 


mother, the dowager Lady Combmartin, up and down this 
troublesome world. Mrs. Crookenden cherished a belief 
that only her brother-in-law’s exaggerated devotion to his 
niece, had prevented poor Lady Dororthy’s tired middle- 
aged feet trotting into the open door of Brattleworthy 
Rectory and there finding rest long ago ; and in propor- 
tion as Mary got out of favour, it appeared to her that 
such highly desirable trotting might even yet be effected. 
She therefore amiably proceeded to blacken the young lady 
to the best of her ability. 

1 My dear Kent, pray don’t run away with the idea that 
I think any blame attaches to you,’ she said, graciously. 

1 Everybody has combined to spoil poor Mary, and put 
her rather out of her place. And then I never can admit 
that Madame Jacobini is quite refined and so on, don’t 
you know. I always feared she might put very odd ideas 
on certain subjects into a girl’s head. And, I think, it has 
proved so. But all that doesn’t lessen my feeling about 
Mary’s behaviour to you.’ 

1 Behaviour to me ? ’ the Rector inquired, quickly. 

* Yes, in making a marriage you disapprove of, after all 
your extraordinary generosity to her.’ 

1 You take my disapproval for granted ; but I have ex- 
pressed none, as far as I am aware.’ 

Mrs. Crookenden moved in her chair with slight im- 
patience. 

‘ Of course you disapprove, everyone must disapprove 
who has Mary’s welfare at all at heart,' she said, in her 
large official manner. 1 She had the chance of making an 
extremely good marriage, and in a fit of caprice throws it 
all aside for the sake of some extraordinary artist, drawing- 
master sort of person, whom — well, really whom one 
knows nothing in the world about.’ 

The Rector began to cheer up. His sister-in-law 
became amusing. To her, he knew, as to such a very 
large section of our fellow country men and women, the 
arts are and always will be, I suppose — it belongs to the 
Anglo-Saxon race — pretty much a matter either of dancing 
dogs or the finishing governess. 

' It is a very odd marriage for a girl who has had her 
advantages, a very poor marriage.’ 


39 ^ 


The Wages of Sin. 


‘ Mr. Colthurst is prepared to make better settlements 
than I anticipated/ the Rector said. 

Then Mrs. Crookenden saw her opportunity, she spread 
all her canvas. In she sailed. 

1 1 am delighted to hear it. Because then I really do 
hope and trust, my dear Kent, that you will begin to 
think a little more of yourself. I consider that your life 
has been completely sacrificed to Mary's extravagance, 
and to her pleasure. Now I do trust you will not make 
her that enormous allowance any longer. If she marries 
this man, let her live in a way suited to her position. 
She has some money of her own ; that and what he makes 
— I suppose that sort of person really makes a good deal 
—ought to be quite enough for her. It must be enough 
for her. You ought to be set free.' 

Mrs. Crookenden glanced at her brother-in-law. She 
never felt quite safe with him, somehow, when it came to 
close quarters. And his aspect just now was not en- 
couraging ; his under jaw protruded, and his eyes followed 
the geometrical figures he described on the gravel with 
the point of his stick. Mrs. Crookenden disliked ex- 
tremely to see the gravel made untidy, but she dominated 
her sense of annoyance. 

‘ Let her begin at a suitable level,' she went on. 

* Who is to determine what level is suitable ? ' the 
Rector inquired. 

4 Oh 1 that is easily determined by the amount of her 
income — her own real income. And, meanwhile, my dear 
Kent, you must begin to live at the level of your real 
income.' 

1 Buy more tobacco than I can smoke, more books than 
I can read, more horses than I can ride,’ he said. 4 1 in- 
crease my establishment, collect a number of greedy ser- 
vants about me, and give them nothing to do ? — No thank 
you, Caroline. I am better as I am.’ 

4 There are other ways of spending money/ Mrs. 
Crookenden said. 1 My dear Kent, the subject is not an 
easy one to approach with you. But you know how often 
I have tried to speak to you about it.' 

• The Rector leaned back in his chair. 

4 What subject ? ' he inquired. 


The Wages are Paid . 


39 7 


* That of marriage.' 

Mrs. Crookenden paused. The Rector doubled himself 
together and fell to drawing those, to his companion, very 
irritating patterns again. 

* Yes/ he said, ‘ I daresay it is difficult to approach. We 
all shelter ourselves, you know, Caroline, as best we can ; 
are most stand-offish where perhaps we feel most strongly. 
Frankly the subject of marriage is an unwelcome one to me. 
I’d rather leave it alone. But let me just state my opinion to 
you plainly. A marriage of reason has always appeared to 
me a wretched travesty of — well, of a very beautiful thing ; 
a travesty so wretched, that no person respecting his own 
intelligence could be guilty of lending himself to it. For 
the only justification of the very peculiar relationship we 
take so calmly for granted under this name of marriage, is 
love. And for a man of my age to fall in love is little short 
of indecent.’ 

* Really, Kent,’ Mrs. Crookenden exclaimed. She was 
very much shocked. 

‘ Therefore,’ he went on, 1 though I regret Mary’s choice 
in some ways, I have acquiesced both in her breaking with 
Aldham, and in* her present engagement. She is making 
a considerable venture, I know ; probably there are diffi- 
culties for her ahead. My object is to make those 
difficulties as little irksome as possible in the only way I 
can, namely by securing her a comfortable and suffi- 
cient income quite independent of her’ — the word stuck in 
his throat — ‘ of her husband. She will, therefore, receive 
precisely the same allowance she always has received.’ 

1 She ought at least to know that it is an allowance, and 
not her own,’ Mrs. Crookenden said. ‘ She ought to be 
told the truth.’ 

The Rector completed a very elaborate curly-cue on the 
grey gravel. 

' I shall not tell her, and, pardon my saying so, I shall 
be seriously annoyed if anyone else does so.'— His tone 
changed, he turned to his companion very courteously.— 
* You have always been a kind friend to me, Caroline, and 
in this little matter you will respect my wishes, I feel sure.’ 

He leaned back, stuck his chin out, and his thumbs in 
the armholes of his waistcoat. 


The Wages of Sin. 


398 

* We all have our trifle of romance/ he said. 1 And my 
trifle happens to be bound up with Polly. It will remain 
bound up with her to the end of the chapter. — Now let us 
talk about something else. What news have you of 
Lance ? ’ 

Mrs. Crookenden had picked up her crochet. The 
enamelled lockets rattled rather aggressively as the tortoise- 
shell needle made its way through the white wool. 

* He was about to start home/ she said. 

< Hearing Polly was free, eh? ’ inquired the Rector. 

* 1 am sure 1 don't know if that was his reason. If it 
was, he will find letters at Bombay which will disabuse 
his mind of that idea. I have urged him, under the cir- 
cumstances, to adhere to his original plan, to continue 
travelling with Mr. Quayle.’ 

* I’m afraid he won’t obey you. If I know Lance, this 
last news will only make him come home the quicker.’ 

For a minute or two Mrs. Crookenden worked on silently 
at her crochet. Then she remarked, with truly alarming 
severity, — 

1 1 must say Mary gives an immense amount of trouble 
to all who have the misfortune of being conrtected with her.’ 

The Rector’s thin lips twitched and turned down oddly 
at one corner. 

1 That’s been the way of pretty women from the begin- 
ning of history/ he said. 

Mrs. Crookenden moved her mouth as though she had 
a bad taste in it. Sometimes she thought, she was sorry 
but she could not help it, that Kent was really rather 
coarse — but then after all there was a suspicion of that, 
you know, in all the Crookendens. 


Chapter II. 

The summer was past. The leaves were falling. The 
fogs had begun. The Connop School had re-opened. 
Colthurst worked hard at this period. In addition to the 
regular routine of school work he had a large picture on 
the stocks, and a portrait of Mary Crookenden. The paint- 
ing of this last gave him profound pleasure, intellectual as 


The IVages are Paid. 


399 


well as of the heart. He has put all his skill, all his love, all 
his divination of Mary's character into the painting of that 
picture. It remains a thing by itself. The public have 
had no opportunity of seeing it as yet ; when it is seen it 
must add solidly to Colthurst's reputation. 

Yet he has not attempted to paint Miss Crookenden in 
what the majority of her admirers would have considered 
her best looks. For he went back on his old first im- 
pression of her. He has painted her pale, the brownish- 
red tinge almost suggestive of tears upon her eyelids and 
a solemnity in her beautiful eyes. He has painted the 
tired, troubled child whom he met years ago on the hillside, 
the fair, sad face which looked up at him out of the brown 
moorland pool ; not the triumphant young beauty whose 
appearance society for some three or four seasons 
so relished. The snow is there, and that strange promise 
— to him so royally fulfilled of late — of fire beneath the 
snow ; but of Miss Crookenden as an exquisite and rather 
heartless taker of scalps there is, I am happy to say, no 
trace. Her moonlight beauty is sweet, pathetic, touched 
with a peculiar and subtle charm. In short, the portrait 
is great as the revelation of a nature — which, after all, is 
the highest way in which any portrait can be great. 

But behind Colthurst's love, behind his work both 
private and public, still lay the unsolved problem of Jenny 
Parris. He had had no explanation with her ; intended 
to have none until his marriage was an accomplished fact. 
He meant to go to her then and tell her, as concisely as 
possible, that the thing was done. This was cruel, perhaps. 
But Colthurst did not care. To shield Mary was his 
increasing and solitary wish ; and he watched over her with 
jealous care, knew all she did, everywhere she went, 
guarded her at every point, as he trusted, from unpleasant 
surprises, unpleasant hints. Meanwhile, to keep Jenny 
away from London was evidently desirable. Regularly 
every week during the past summer — for Colthurst was 
curiously methodical in some matters — he had forwarded 
her allowance via Captain Prust. Finally he wrote to her 
advising her wintering on the south coast for health’s 
sake. He knew there would be a certain danger in 
making this suggestion. Ten to one it would have pre- 


400 


The Wages of Sin . 


cisely the reverse effect to that he intended, Jenny having 
a pernicious disposition to do exactly what she was asked 
not to do. Still it was incumbent upon him to make the 
suggestion, both for her own and for safety’s sake. 
Colthurst received no answer to his letter. 

It point of fact, Jenny, after long hungering for some 
recognition, some sign from him beyond that inevitable 
weekly sum of money — which in her unreasoning, hot- 
headed way she had come to hate — finding his letter 
contained no tenderness, gave no hope of softening on his 
part, tore it up, in a passion of misery ; and then, poor 
impulsive soul, sewed the fragments of it — as a sort of 
amulet — into a corner of the piece of red flannel she wore 
to protect her chest. And further, she proceeded to pack 
the paper-parcels, band-boxes, and sea-chest, notwith- 
standing Dot’s tears and angry protests. She must go 
away, go back to Delamere Crescent ; for there, at least, it 
was possible to get at him, to send for him, if the worst 
came to the worst. With her usual luck, she lighted on a 
streaming day for her journey, and caught a cold on the 
Bishopstoke platform changing trains, which speedily 
undid the good her long sojourn by the seaside had done 
her. 

So, by the middle of October, Jenny was back in her 
old quarters again, Colthurst ignorant of the fact, she 
ignorant of his changed prospects. And thus things might 
have remained, but for the gentleman connected with the 
dramatic profession — the music-hall artist, in plain English 
— who happened at this period to rent Mrs. Prust’s drawing- 
room floor. For, returning in the small hours, his morning 
sleep was a great consequence to the gentleman in 
question; and that racking, straining cough of Jenny’s in 
the room immediately below — it usually came on badly 
when she woke bathed in perspiration between four and 
five o’clock — so disturbed his slumbers, that he had to 
complain to Mrs. Prust. The good woman, with a handsome 
disregard of monetary considerations, took him up rather 
short; informing him that there were plenty of other 
apartments to let both ends of the Crescent, so if hers 
didn't give satisfaction, he had best suit himself elsewhere. 

4 For,’ she added, blinking and gurgling with emotion as 


The Wages are Paid. 


401 


she proceeded downstairs after the interview, ' the poor 
young thing shan’t be drove out of this house, cough 
or no cough, as long as me and the Capt’n’s above 
ground.’ 

Jenny’s cough not mending, however, the gentleman 
belonging to the dramatic profession took Mrs. Prust at 
her word and sought another domicile. Mrs. Prust had 
the magnanimity not to disclose the cause of his abrupt 
departure ; but, since the balance must be kept and excess 
of kindness in one direction of necessity begets defect 
in another, by a process of logic peculiar to herself 
she elected to hold Colthurst responsible for the loss 
of her lodger. She, therefore, once again, without con- 
sulting Jenny, despatched her reluctant master mariner to 
W entworth Street in search of him, bearing a notification 
of Jenny's condition and a request 'that Mr. Colthurst 
would be pleased to lose no time in coming and looking 
into it all himself.' 

But the message did not get itself delivered till next 
morning ; for Colthurst was dining in St. George’s Road. 
It was a very happy little dinner, the happier, perhaps, 
because Madame Jacobini had a headache which pre- 
vented her appearing until afterwards in the drawing- 
room. Colthurst was singularly brilliant that night ; he 
had forgotten the great cat Fate and her random selection of 
victims. He talked his best, was full of energy, of schemes 
for coming pictures; his hesitating, urgent speech was 
unusually effective, varied, eloquent. Antony Hammond 
and Mr. Carr, who happened to come in for an hour 
during the course of the evening, both left under the spell 
of his wonderful force and vitality, left with the sense 
of having assisted at a rather superb exhibition of intel- 
lectual and artistic activity. Even Madame Jacobini was 
carried off her feet. 

' Good heavens, my dear child,’ she exclaimed, when he 
went away at last ; ' but with the best will in the world to 
think otherwise, I must own that your Tartar is fasci- 
nating, when he pleases — absolutely fascinating. And it is 
not only his talk, for one has a conviction the creature 
will be as good as his word. He inspires one with a 
really marvellous confidence in his powers/ 


o n 


402 


The Wages of Sin. 


Mary laughed. It appeared to her, also, that 'the 
creature ’ was magnificently capable, and that there was 
an ever new delight in loving and being loved by him. 

But though — to make use once more of his own rathei 
pagan illustration — though Colthurst might forget the great 
cat Fate, she had not forgotten him. Who, indeed, does 
she ever forget, if it comes to that ? For while he dined 
with Miss Crookenden in St. George’s Road, Captain 
Prust, arriving at the moment of the meal, sat down to 
supper with the landlady and her daughter in Wentworth 
Street. And the latter, as thank-offering for much nautical 
anecdote, supplied him with information of an extremely 
interesting character. — This would be about the last of his 
journeys here, they supposed, in search of Mr. Colthurst. 
Why didn’t he — Captain Prust — know ? And then 
followed the current gossip. An heiress — for Mr. Colthurst 
knew how to feather his own nest, it seemed — the lady's 
name, a decidedly exaggerated account of her wealth and 
position, and how she had come more than once in her 
own carriage to leave a note ; her direction, too, but they 
weren’t sure of the number. 

As he went home with that rolling, sea-faring gait of 
his, Captain Prust took his pipe out of his mouth more 
than once, and exclaimed aloud : 

1 Lord love you, whatever will S’lome say ? S’lome '11 
raise a breeze will S’lome, and let him have it hot 
somehow.’ 

But someone with greater capacity — in the present 
case — for * letting him have it hot ’ than even Mrs. 
Prust, notwithstanding that good lady’s gifts of state- 
ment, took this matter in hand. For the next after- 
noon, though there was a drizzling leaden-grey fog 
and though she had hardly been out of the house 
since her return, Jenny herself sallied forth. Dot teazed 
to go too, but her mother bade her stay at home in 
a tone which rather surprised that forth-coming and coer- 
cive little person. First Jenny visited the newsagent, who 
kept the post-office two streets off, and with his assistance 
made out a certain address from the directory. Then 
she went away slowly through the chill of the dreary 
late autumn day, holding the fur shoulder-cape, she wore 


The Wages are Paid. 


403 


over her claret-coloured ulster, together across her aching 
chest ; breathing with difficulty in the thick atmosphere, 
stopping now and again to fight down a fit of coughing ; 
yet carrying her head erect, moving with some of her old, 
statuesque grace, supported by the terrible purpose she had 
at heart. Several times she lost herself, for the fog grew 
denser as the afternoon advanced, and it was not easy to read 
the names of the streets — overshot the turning she wanted, 
made her way back again, found the house at last. 

Jenny stood on the pavement looking up at it. A soft 
glow came through the lace curtains of the drawing- 
room windows ; even from the outside it had an effect of 
luxury which bitterly incensed her. She leaned against 
the right-hand pillar of the portico to recover her breath. 
The clammy cold of the fog wrapped her round like a wet 
sheet, until she shivered ; yet the stifling, choking pain at 
her chest made her long for more air, not less. For respira- 
tion is hardly comfortable work when you have spit up the 
larger half of one lung and the vessels of the other at e 
clogged by matter and blood. 

As she waited in the heavy leaden greyness, a broug- 
ham drove up, and almost immediately the house door 
opened disclosing a perspective of warm colour and 
subdued light within. A young lady came the length 
of the hall, out on to the steps, and then turned 
to give some message to the maid holding open the 
door. Jenny had a full view of her. She saw a woman, 
tall, richly dressed, mistress of herself, and perfectly 
finished from head to heel as only women of the leisured 
classes can be — have time and money to be. Saw a lovely 
face, with a sort of lofty gladness in its expression, as of 
one who carries store of some great happiness constantly 
about with her. For the moment she was almost awed, 
almost moved to pity ; this woman was so young, so serene, 
so very fair. But jealousy such as Jenny’s knows neither 
fear or mercy for long. From the first she did not question 
Mary's identity; and the contrast between herself, ill, worn, 
wretched, spoilt, standing on the greasy pavement, and 
this exquisite child of good fortune, was too glaring. It 
infuriated Jenny, it inspired her with the daring and the 
dignity of intolerable wrong. She shook back her ne^ 

DD2 


404 


The Wages of Sin . 


swept forward, stood at the bottom of the steps, the light 
from the open hall door falling upon her. She looked full, 
aggressively at Mary, as the latter prepared to descend the 
steps. 

* You’m Miss Crookenden ? ’ she said. 

The young lady, startled, slightly annoyed, bowed a 
sufficiently haughty assent. 

1 Then I'm bound to speak to you/ Jenny added. 

This handsome, battered woman, her appearance at once 
showy and shabby, her bearing almost insolent, her 
manner almost authoritative, was displeasing to Miss 
Crookenden from every point of view. 

i I think you are under some mistake/ she replied. ’ 1 1 
am not aware that I know you.' 

* No, you don’t know me, and that’s just where it is/ 
Jenny returned. * You’m bound to know me, to know all 
about me/ 

Mary tried to retain her cold indifference of manner, but 
the incident was unexpected to the point of embarrassment 
and she spoke with a certain haste 

1 I cannot stay to hear what you may have to say now. 
I have an engagement. As you see, the carriage is waiting. 
I am going out. And I have no idea on what subject 
you can possibly require to speak to me/ 

Jenny came up two steps, came close to her. 

' I want to speak to you about the man you’m going to 
marry — about James Colthurst/ she said. 

An indeterminate, vague horror seemed to pass before 
Mary Crookenden. 

1 I do not discuss Mr. Colthurst with strangers/ she 
replied. 

1 I'm no stranger/ Jenny said, contemptuously. * Jim 
and me have been pretty intimate for a sight of years now/ 

And then, in obedience to one of those swift changes of 
feeling which made her at once so impossible and — in a 
way — so fine, Jenny, seeing the growing fear in the 
young face before her, spoke indulgently, as one speaks to 
a child. 

* There, I don’t want to hurt you more’n I can help/ 
she said. * And it ain’t fit for such as you to be standing 
here talking to me in the street, You’m bound to hear it 


The Wages are Paid. 


405 


all sooner or later, best get it over at once. Send away 
your carriage, and let me come inside/ 

Swallowing the cold, damp air as she talked provoked 
Jenny’s cough. She leaned one hand on the balustrade of 
the portico now for support, for the exertion of coughing 
doubled her together and made her unsteady on her feet. 

* It’ll pass,' she gasped, 1 after a bit. Only let me come 
inside. I won’t keep you longer than I must. — It’ll be pretty 
rough on both of us — but let me come in. The fog’s 
killing and I am awful tired. Let me rest a bit/ 

Mary Crookenden debated ; and then, moved by the 
sight of the woman’s sad condition, moved by that indeter- 
minate horror — to which any certainty, however damaging, 
seemed preferable — making a sign to Jenny to follow, 
turned and went into the house. 

1 If anyone calls I am engaged,’ she said to the amazed 
and discreetly blank-faced Hannah. * Remember I see no 
one until I ring. The carriage can go back to the stables ; 
if I want it I will send round later/ 

She led the way into the dining-room. The shaded 
lamp hanging over the dinner table was already lighted, 
and the table laid for three. Colthurst dined with the two 
ladies again to-night, dined early, as they proposed going 
to the theatre. Her own picture looked at Mary with an 
odd fixedness— so it seemed — from its easel in a shadowy 
corner of the charming, tasteful room. She stood just out of 
the circle of light cast by the lamp. She pulled off her 
gloves, locked her hands together, her attitude strained, 
her face unresponsive, set like a mask. 

1 You had better sit down,’ she said, ‘ since you are 
tired. And please oblige me by telling me what you wish 
to tell me briefly and at once.’ 

Jenny took the nearest chair, perforce, for she had not 
strength to stand and talk both. It happened to be the 
one set at the table for Colthurst. Mary bit her lip. It was 
all she could do to prevent crying out. — Then Jenny 
glanced round the room deliberately; glanced at the portrait 
in the shadowy corner, at the silver, the dainty glass, the 
dessert and heaped up flowers upon the dinner table, 
finally fastened her eyes upon the girl herself. 

< Jim knows well enough what he’s about as usual,’ she 


40 6 


The Wages of Sin. 


said ; and her jealousy, her sense of the immense contrast 
between her own lot and that of her companion, became 
well nigh insupportable. She leaned back in her chair, 
resting both wrists on the table, and stated her case against 
Colthurst baldly, mercilessly, without gradation, without 
those extenuating circumstances which put so wholly differ- 
ent a complexion upon some phases at all events of her 
miserable history. But jealousy and envy raised the devil 
in poor Jenny Parris. She struck and struck again, caring 
nothing how or where she struck so long as she drew blood. 

1 You want to have it short — very well, then, here it is. 
My name's Jane Parris. I come from Beera Mills, over 
right Brattleworthy, where you Crookenden folks live. 
Jim painted me there, made me love him there, a dozen 
years ago. And Jim’s like that, once care for him you can’t 
get along without him. I couldn’t stay when he was gone. 

1 came up after him here to London.’ 

The red showed in a hard triangle on either of Jenny’s 
hollow cheeks. 

* You want to have it,’ she repeated, flinging the short, 
gasping sentences at Mary Crookenden, with a growing 
violence. * Well, then, listen here. He's kept me ever 
since, except when I've kept him. I’ve a child he’s the 
father of. He keeps us still.’ 

And the sentences hit Mary Crookenden blow on blow till 
her imagination positively rocked under them. Still she 
managed to maintain a show of outward calm. 

1 You make these dreadful assertions, but you bring no 
proof,' she said, proudly. ‘ I have nothing beyond your 
bare word for their truth. Till I have more than that I 
shall not believe them.’ 

Yet even while she spoke Mary’s mind misgave her. 
All Colthurst’s allusions to a shame and wretchedness in 
his life, his old declaration that his love was hopeless, his 
later attempts to tell her that which she persistently refused 
to hear, Lancelot’s hinted story — all these crowded into her 
mind, giving the woman’s statements a distressing air of 
probability. 

1 If you don’t believe me, ask Jim then/ Jenny replied. 
* Jim’s cruel hard by times, but I’ve never known him lie. 
He won’t deny me and the child ; I don’t think that of 


The Wages are Paid. 


40; 


him. And Cap’n and Mrs. Prust know all about it. And, 
if you want proofs, Pve got letters and things of his down 
to our place. And if you want more, well, there’s the child 
— if you don’t believe me, I reckon you’ve only to look a bit 
at Dot.' 

In her increasing excitement Jenny pulled off her hat, 
threw it down on the carpet beside her and with her left 
hand impatiently rubbed back the masses of her dark 
hair. She was very terrible just then in her coarsened 
beauty, her untidy attire, her broken health, her great 
sense of wrong. Mary saw her face clearly for the 
first time ; saw it and alas! knew it, wasted by disease, dis- 
figured by passion though it was, for the face of the woman 
in Colthurst’s great picture, the face of the woman of Sierra- 
combe deer-park, and knowing it turned sick as death. 

1 Have you done ? ’ she said. 1 Because if so, go — go at 
once.’ 

Jenny swept the glasses, the fish knife and fork to left 
and right, pushed the basket-folded napkin back against 
the flowers, obliterated the place laid for Colthurst — for 
the man she loved, the man whom, in obedience to that 
love (so queerly does human affection display itself) she 
was now seeking to blast and dishonour — forgetting all his 
patience towards her, forgetting too — and let us not forget 
it, for sentiment in these lamentable cases is very much too 
prone to run amuck at the man, and range itself wholly 
and blindly on the side of the woman — forgetting that in 
the first instance she was at least as much to blame as he 
was, as much tempter as tempted, as ready to seduce as to 
yield to seduction. Then she rested her elbows on the 
table, her chin in both hands, and gazed fixedly once more 
at Miss Crookenden. 

1 No, I’ve not done yet,’ she answered. 1 For he’s mine, 
he’s mine by right, mine before Almighty God. Times and 
again he promised he’d marry me. And so I swore I’d 
come and tell you.’ 

‘ And you have told me/ Mary said. 1 Now go.' 

‘ But will you give him up ? ' Jenny demanded. 

For a long minute the two looked across the dinner-table 
into each other’s eyes. 

1 Till I know more, no/ Mary Crookenden said. 


408 


The Wages of Sin. 


* Ah ! you’re a brave one/ Jenny cried. Then she 
settled her chin in her hands again. — * All the same he’s 
mine, I tell you. What’ll you do for him against what I've 
done ? Will you wash and mend and cook for him, stretch 
his canvasses, clean his palettes, stand for him the livelong 
day in your clothes and out of them ? ' 

Mary made a movement of haughty repudiation. Jenny 
tossed back her head, and her voice, husky from that ailing 
throat and chest, grew fuller, deeper, with sheer force of 
defiant emotion. 

1 I’ve done that, and more than that,’ she went on. 

* When he was ill and times were bad, I’ve worked for 
him. I've stood model in all the studios worth naming in 
London, and Paris too for that matter. And the painters 
have been rarely pleased to get me, for I’ve had my share 
of good looks as well as the rest. — And I’ve done more’n 
that. Four years ago when he was took so ill it was 
summer time, and the schools were shut and most everyone 
was holiday-making, so trade was awful slack.’ 

Jenny paused, lowered her eyes, began playing nervously 
with Colthurst’s fish knife and fork. 

1 But there's one trade at which a healthy woman can 
always make a living in a big town, worse luck. And J im 
was awful bad. It was touch and go with him. We hadn’t 
a brass farthing left.' 

Her head went down into her hands, her shoulders 
heaved and shook. 

1 And Jim’s not the man you’ll let die if there’s a way to 
help it. He's worth a sight too much. So I took to that 
trade. To keep him and the child alive I walked the cursed 
hell of those Paris streets.’ 

On those last words a long silence followed. Mary 
Crookenden stood perfectly still, a great sense of disgrace 
upon her, making her whole body burn and tingle from head 
to foot. For the gross bestial side of existence, the smallest 
hint of which all her life long she had so studiously and 
proudly ignored, from which she had turned so loftily away, 
suddenly lay bare and open before her. The corruption 
which runs below the seemly surface of our every-day life, 
even as sewers below some majestic city, the corruption 
which is a constant quantity in human nature, civilized and 


The Wages are Paid. 


409 


savage alike, suddenly sent up its stench into her nostrils. 
And so, just now, it was not her private grief, not the ques- 
tion of Colthurst’s wrong-doing, his guilt or innocence in 
respect of this unhappy woman, not the question of his 
future relation to herself, which so appalled Mary Crooken- 
den ; rather was it this uncompromising revelation of the 
evil — ah ! the infinite pity of it ! — indissolubly joined, as 
beast with god, to that apparently best and dearest gift 
bestowed on mortals, the gift of love. 

‘The Lord’ll forgive me,’ Jenny murmured hoarsely, at 
last. ‘ I reckon He will, but I doubt Jim won’t never 
forgive. Jim can’t forget it. He always goes back on it. 
He’s been changed to me ever since.’ 

After a while she raised her head, got on to her feet. 
Pushed back her hair languidly, tried to pin on her hat ; 
but now that her passion was spent she felt her weakness 
doubly. The room turned with her, she was giddy and 
faint. 

‘ I’ll go. I’ve told you pretty well all, as I swore I’d tell 
any of you fine ladies who he might want to marry. Now 
you know how it stands between him and me.’ 

Jenny lurched, laid hold of the back of the chair, sat 
down again. 

‘I’ll go,’ she repeated. ‘But I feel mortal bad. I’m 
parched.' 

A cut glass jug of iced water was standing on the table 
near her. She put out her hand, tried to raise it ; but her 
wrist gave, the ice rattled and the water slopped over on 
to the cloth. — ‘ Ah ! dear heart,’ Jenny exclaimed. 

Then Mary Crookenden recovered herself, and putting a 
great force upon herself, came round from the further side 
of the table, took the claret glass that had been set for 
Colthurst, filled it with water, placed a dessert dish before 
the woman full of grapes. 

‘ Eat — drink,’ she said. 

So far Jenny had thought only of herself, had acted under 
the dominion of her sense of injury alone. But the tone of 
Miss Crookenden’s grave voice, the graciousness of her 
action, stirred the nobler spirit in poor Jenny. And as she 
looked up at the girl, and saw the proudly glad face of less 
than an hour ago cruelly altered, rigid and ghastly as that of 


410 


The Wages of Sin. 


a corpse, she understood something of the immense suffer- 
ing she had inflicted, repented, was overcome by remorse. 

' No, no/ she said, pushing away the grapes. 1 I'll go 
— I must go. I'm not so bad but what I can walk, and it's 
not fitting I should eat or drink in this house.' 

She rose, went through the warm, bright hall, opened 
the street door. Then she gave a great cry, for there 
against the blurred, shifting, mournful dimness of the fog 
was Colthurst's tall, high-shouldered figure. 

1 Ah ! you are here, you’ve seen her, you have taken 
your revenge at last. D-damn you, damn you, d-damn 
you, Jenny Parris,’ he said. 


Chapter III. 

At sea it was a wild night, and on land it was not much 
better. The half-dozen small slate-roofed houses that 
cluster about the four roads at Beera Cross were shut up, 
only a square of redness here and there, through a curtain 
tight-strained behind the flower-pots, across their little 
windows. The Brattleworthy carrier’s van stops to set 
down passengers, on its way back from Yeomouth, three 
times a week at the Cross about eight o’clock. And Jenny 
Parris staggered, as she stepped out of that close-packed, 
jolting, rattling vehicle. 

This was one of her impulsive escapades, one of her 
mad revolts against circumstance and conditions. All 
other comfort failing, her heart had turned in unreason- 
ing desire towards her own people, her own country. 
It had seemed to her that once down in the West all 
would be changed, health and beauty would come back; 
for poor Jenny was incurably hopeful even at this pass. 
And so, not as repentant prodigal but as seeker after 
her lost youth, she had left Delamere Crescent that 
morning, left kindly Mrs. Prust tearful, shaking her head. 
And as the train brought her further and further westward, 
as the soft air caressed her cheek, the fine-featured, high- 
coloured, West country folk met her eye, the glib familiar 


The Wages are Paid. 


4i 1 

speech met her ear, Jenny's spirits rose. She had felt 
unusually well to-day, the dragging weight of illness had 
become less burdensome. — Dave would be good to her, 
father would be good to her. The path of life, which for 
so long now had run persistently downhill, would turn, 
begin to ascend disclosing pleasant prospects. She longed, 
with a foolish, unreasoning, heart-sick longing, for the 
smell of the sea, longed to handle the herring nets, longed 
to hear the trample and grind of the ground-swell on the 
beach. It seemed to her, as I say, she might recover 
thus her lost youth ; and recovering that, might even yet 
recover her lost love. Colthurst might return to her, 
return forgetting much that had fallen out but ill of late, 
forgetting the terrible words he had spoken, forgetting all 
— as she just now was so willing to forget — save that once, 
long ago, here in the tender-hearted West country she and 
he had courted and loved. 

This sounds absurd; but the Celt is always absurd, 
extravagant, impossible. Of them it is written, 1 They 
went forth to the war, but they always fell.' Written 
truly — romantic, wrong-headed, infinitely pathetic race ! 
And now, at this lowest ebb of her fortunes, the irre- 
pressible Celt arose in Jenny, making her sing a swan- 
song of longing, of foolish, baseless hope. If she went 
away from London, went away to the home of her girl- 
hood, she would find her girlhood there, awaiting her. 

But the swan-song had died down, somewhat, during 
those jolting nine miles out from Yeomouth ; died down 
yet lower as she stood now in the open space before the 
small, close-shut cottages at Beera Cross, while the 
carrier's van rattled and bumped away into the distance 
along the straight, high-banked Roman road. For there 
was still a good mile to walk, and the night, though 
warm, was wild ; and the westerly wind, though soft as 
milk, was boisterous. It drove shouting over the bare 
upland country, broke in great waves against the little 
huddled houses, roared through the oak, beech and larch 
woods where it struck them in the windings of the combe. 
The moon was past the full, a low-hanging, stormy moon, 
blurred and irregular in outline, and encircled by a great 
reddish halo ; a moon showing fitfully between the floats 


412 


The Wages of Sin. 


of dark ragged cloud, that raced up out of the Atlantic 
across the pallid grey-green sky and across her face. 

Jenny had not reckoned with accessories of storm and 
darkness when she set forth 1 ; had not reckoned seriously 
with the fact that she knew practically nothing of what 
awaited her at Beera, did not know, indeed, whether her 
father was yet alive or not. In starting on this wild- 
goose chase her mind, according to its fatal custom, had 
overstepped intervening difficulties and grasped merely at 
the fancied end to be reached. But now alone, save for 
Dot, — bewildered and sleepy, clinging in most unwonted 
spirit of dependence close against her, — face to face with 
the tumult of the night, poor Jenny’s swan-song died down, 
and the intervening difficulties took on large propor- 
tions. She dreaded the long walk down the combe ; the 
van was gone, however, and a shyness possessed her, she 
could not make up her mind to knock at those closed doors 
and ask for a night’s shelter or even for a lantern, so she 
turned down the steep lane which seemed to yawn a dark 
abyss ahead. 

Dot hung back. The London-bred child, at home in the 
streets, fearless before that most alarming of all phenomena 
to some of us, a human crowd, shrunk from this close- 
ness to nature. 

1 Oh ! I’m awful scared to go down into that ugly old 
black place, Mammy,’ she whispered. 

Jenny was half scared herself. But there was no help 
for it. So she kept tight hold of the child’s hand. 

‘ Don’t be a silly,’ she said. * There’s nothing to harm 
you. We’m going home.’ 

And so hugging the left bank for shelter, stumbling in the 
deep, moist wheel-tracks by the roadside, they struggled on. 

At the turn of the combe the little church, nestled in 
the hillside, rose sharply defined against the gloom of 
woods beyond. And the grave-stones stood up white and 
stark, seeming to move, sway, incline towards each other 
in ghostly confabulation as the cloud shadows rushed over 
them. Then Jenny, superstitious as she was, became 
scared in truth. And though her breath was short, her 
knees weak, she hurried the child on down the hill, gasp- 
ing, not daring to look behind her. For in the cry and 


The Wages are Paid. 


4t3 


swish of the wind, in the rustle of fallen oak and beech 
leaves whirling along the road-way beside her, she heard 
the stifled, pleading voices of the dead — mother, friends of 
long ago, a baby sister whom she had lost as little more 
than a baby herself, poor nameless corpses, too, cast up 
maimed and disfigured by the ocean along that iron 
coast — calling to her to come and join them, to lie beside 
them in their shallow, rock-floored graves. Her pace 
quickened almost to a run. The swan-song of hope died 
out completely in her heart; and Dot fell to sobbing, 
mingling her pitiful little private and personal out-cry 
with the thousand-tongued lament of the gale in the 
woods. 

Here the road narrows, is more closed in and overhung 
by trees. A heavy cloud obscured the moon too, making 
the darkness for some hundred yards profound. And 
poor Dot sobbed and slipped, slipped and sobbed. She 
had on a smart little pair of new yellow boots, high-heeled, 
smooth-soled, a present from Captain Prust, as ill-suited 
as boots could well be to the alternately rocky and slimy 
road — for, thanks to the large amount of rain which had 
fallen of late, springs had broken up right in the middle of 
it, washing the road-metal bare in places and in others 
forming long streaks of rusty, iron-stained mud. Fortu- 
nately the wind lessened, there was a partial lull, the 
tumult of sound abated. Jenny walked slower. She felt as 
though she had a band across her chest that was being 
drawn ever tighter and tighter till the pain of it amounted 
to agony, and her mouth filled — she knew the taste only 
too well — filled with blood. 

Just then the moon sailed out from behind the cloud and 
spread a tender sorrowful-seeming light over the road, the 
woods, and the steep hillsides. And immediately on her 
right, weird, mystic, fairy-like under that thin, silvery 
radiance, Jenny saw the rough cart-track buried in large- 
leaved butter-burr, leading up through the larch plantation 
to the disused stone-quarry ; the gate, the little bridge of 
slate slabs spanning the stream. It was here she and 
Colthurst had given and taken their first fatal kiss, and so 
the spot was dear and dreadful to her both at once. 

Still, though she wiped it away again and again, the 


4 T 4 


The Wages of Sin. 


blood rose in her throat, stained her lips. She had never 
bled like this before ; and a sombre belief settled down on 
Jenny that at this rate the voices calling from the church- 
yard would not call long in vain; that not health and 
recovered girlhood but something very different awaited 
her in the little white-walled town that weary half-mile 
below. And the settling down of this belief was very 
frightful to her. With the giving-out of hope came a 
giving-out of physical strength. She was too distressed, 
too disheartened, for the moment, to go further. She 
crossed the rough bridge, sank down among the lush 
damp growth of grass and ferns, leaned her poor head 
against the gate-post. While Dot, throwing her arms 
about her mother’s waist, hiding her face in her lap, cried 
aloud — partly in panic terror of the storm, the loneliness, 
the large mystery of the night, partly in childish misery 
over the soiling and spoiling by mud and wet of her smart, 
new, yellow boots. 

1 1 wants to go back, Mammy. I wants to go back to 
the Capt’n and Mrs. Prust,’ she wailed. 1 It’s awful ugly 
here with nothing but trees and no streets. Why ever 
don’t they light the gas ? And I’m ever so hungry, and 
there’s cold creepy-crawlies running up my legs. And 
the moon’s nasty, all crooked like it’s got a swelled face. 
Oh ! Mammy, let’s go back. I won’t never call it poky 
again if you’ll only go back.’ 

But as the blood rose, hot, acrid, nauseous into her 
mouth, the conviction deepened in Jenny that she should 
never go back. Yet it was not so much the fear of death 
as an immense, profound, all-engulfing regret for the false 
promises of life which caused her most poignant grief. 
Pushing the crying child away with an incontrollable 
movement of impatience, she flung the skirt of her gown 
up over her face and head, and thus veiled, rocked herself 
to and fro in the frail moonlight, and wept and wept. 


The Wages are Paid. 


415 


Chapter IV. 

On the window-seat in the Rector’s study among an 
orderly confusion of piled up pamphlets, transactions of 
learned societies in drab and blue covers, and miscel- 
laneous disjecta membra of printed matter, Mary Crooken- 
den sat waiting for the post to come in. The Rector’s 
study, though uncompromisingly square, is a pleasant 
room, lined on three sides with book-shelves from floor to 
ceiling. Its furnishings are by no means new, but they 
have a certain friendly comfortableness about them from 
long use. Mary could remember the room just as it now 
was, since the early years of her childhood. Neither it or 
Uncle Kent ever changed. The firelight danced over the 
big tiger-skin rug and the deep crimson-covered arm-chairs 
just as cosily, and Kent Crookenden's steady, kindly eyes 
met hers just as reassuringly now as when she wore those 
very short and staring-coloured frocks which had so 
disturbed Mrs. Crookenden's sense of propriety. 

Out of doors the three days’ gale was abating at last ; 
but the wind sti’l blew gusty, driving the fine, soft rain 
past the window in silver-grey scuds. The heart-shaped 
lawn and carriage-sweep were strewn with leaves, the 
rusty reds and browns of which offered a sharp contrast 
to the vivid green of the turf and purple-blue tones of 
the shingly gravel. The said carriage-sweep is bordered 
by a thick-set shrubbery of rhododendron under a ring of 
trees ; the upper branches of which, bared by the gale, 
framed in an irregular oval of grey sky, while between 
the trunks of them looking away to the front gate past the 
stables, was a vagueness of hurrying mist. 

Nature still quivered, as it seemed, from the recent 
violence of storm and tempest. The outlook was a 
melancholy one ; but Mary liked it none the less well for 
that. She felt grateful, indeed, to the Earth-Mother for 
setting her great symphony in a minor key, and fingering 
out only low-toned pensive music. For over the girl, like- 


4i 6 


The Wages of Sin . 


wise, a tempest had passed, from which she still quivered, 
from which her inward sky was still overcast. The shock 
of her interview with James Colthurst’s former mistress 
had been profound, had shaken the very foundations of 
her being. It had wounded her pride ; wounded her moral 
sense ; had endangered her trust in herself and in those 
innate beliefs which had so far ruled her conduct ; it had 
changed all the values ; put a new complexion on much 
she had learned of late to hold dearest. It had effected 
nothing less, indeed, than a revolution in her outlook on 
life. Finally, it had raised a practical question of the very 
gravest moment ; a question which it was impossible to 
ignore, which she was compelled to answer. Not that her 
affection for Colthurst was lessened. It remained ; its 
dominion over her was strong as ever. But the quality 
of it had suffered change. It had lost its brilliancy, lost 
its fearless delight, above all, had lost its innocence. For 
during her interview with Jenny Parris she had been 
forced, willy-nilly, to eat of the fruit of the tree of the 
knowledge of good and evil, and to her sorrow, to her 
shame — a shame, the bitterness of which no man, I fancy, 
will ever quite understand or measure — her eyes were 
opened. She recoiled with the anger, with the fierce 
disdain, that is a constant quantity in the purity of a noble 
young girl. 

And under the influence of that recoil she too had 
turned her steps westward. She required to be alone, 
required to think. Required to adjust her mind to the 
altered aspect that this bitter increase of knowledge gave 
to life. Required, above all, to find an answer to that 
practical question of right and wrong, the answering of 
which — for she did not permit herself to blink the truth — 
involved not only her own future, but that of three other 
persons as well. 

The fundamental rectitude of Mary's nature displayed 
itself rather admirably at this juncture. Cost her what 
it might, until that question was answered, she had told 
herself she would not see James Colthurst again. 

Happily Slerracombe House was empty, Mrs. Crooken- 
den and Carrie having gone up to London to welcome the 
Duckingfields back from their wedding-tour, and assist 


The Wages are Paid. 


417 


in inducting them to the large and somewhat funereal 
mansion they had elected to take in Cromwell Road. So 
Brattleworthy offered a safe harbour of refuge, as it 
appeared to our storm-tost maiden, where she might think 
the sad thoughts born of deepening experience and arrive 
at right conclusions in peace. 

Cyprian Aldham, it is true, was still at Beera, for he had 
turned back in a sternly ascetic spirit to undiluted clerical- 
ism and parochialism on the breaking off of his marriage. 
The sacerdotal note was the master-note, after all, in 
Mr. Aldham. But then it appeared probable to Mary that 
Aldham would dislike meeting her, at least as much as 
she would dislike meeting him; so that she did not think 
it necessary to let his neighbourhood deter her from going 
to Brattleworthy. She wanted quiet, she wanted the 
support of an unbiassed judgment; and that support, 
when she had sufficient fortitude to tell her grief and 
ask for it, she believed, and rightly, she would get from 
her uncle, the Rector. 

The post came in extra late, as it invariably does when 
one sits at the window wishing and watching. But it 
came at last, and Mary received her letters. 

One from dear faithful Sara Jacobini, that was a matter 
of course. One with Indian stamps and post-marks. 
Mary sighed, laid it in her lap unopened. — What poor 
Lance had to say would keep ; it could not be gay reading, 
particularly just now. But there was a third letter, to 
which Mary’s fingers clung very tenderly as she handled 
it, while her eyebrows drew together and her lips grew 
white. 

1 How can I reason with you ? ’ Colthurst wrote. 

* You have flown off at a tangent. You forget that 

nothing is really altered in our relation to one 

another. I am substantially the same person, you sub- 
stantially the same likewise. The past days are just as 

sacred, the coming days may be just as sweet as ever 

we dreamed before you knew this thing. And see, 
it was always there — there no more, but equally, there 
no less, now that you know of its existence. It has 
become not one bit more real, more actual, more potent 
for evil, by the fact of your having knowledge of it. 

E E 


418 


The Wages oj Sin . 


Therefore, be reasonable, my best beloved. Don’t mis- 
take shadow for substance ; regard the thing simply — in 
an unexaggerated light. Do not allow sentiment to warp 
your judgment.’ 

If this trenched on sophistry, to Mary it was sophistry 
of a dangerously coercive sort. For as she read she 
could hear Colthurst’s voice, broken, by emotion, urgent, 
yet gentle, pleading with her in every sentence. Could 
feel the strange charm alike of his power and his weak- 
ness ; the upsetting pathos of the man’s tremendous per- 
sonality combined with his childlike trust and dependence 
on herself. Ah ! it was splendid after all to be loved by 
James Colthurst. 

Instinctively she shifted her position a little, raised her 
head, her eyes began to dilate, her lips to regain their 
colour. And as she moved, Lancelot’s unopened letter 
fetched way, slipped off her lap, lodged in a cleft between 
the Anthropological Society’s reports and the transactions 
of the British Association for 18 — . Mary paid no heed 
to it ; after a minute’s pause she read on. 

‘And see, my darling, at least I have done you no 
wrong. Long before I met you last summer, I had parted, 
to all intents and purposes, with Jenny Parris. Years 
ago she pleased the baser part of me — but, it is a profana- 
tion to speak of the affection I once bore her and that 
which I bear you, on the same page. Women such as you 
have but one sort of love to give, holy, undefiled, com- 
plete. We men, alas, have many sorts of love to give, 
so you must not judge us by your standard. Nature 
perhaps, custom and habit certainly, have made us 
grievously different in this respect. Only understand 
that whatever quality of love I may have entertained for 
her is dead long ago. She herself, by her own action, 
destroyed it. Still I have no desire to go into that, to 
clear myself at her expense, or to use her offences as a 
cloak for my own. I will deal justly by her — don’t be 
afraid. She shall not want and her child shall be pro- 
vided for. But from henceforth she passes out of our 
lives — yours and mine. I will arrange all that. And 
yet, though it sounds like a paradox, I am almost thankful 
she declared herself to you, for now no shadow of con- 


The Wages are Paid. 


419 


cealment is between us. You know, I tried to tell you, 
but you would not hear. Believe me, if you can forgive 
the passing distress, that this has happened is best for us 
both — if you will only be reasonable/ 

Mary leaned her head against the window sash, and 
gazed out at the wind and wet. It was not easy to resist 
that pleading voice; while easy enough, in response to 
its pleading, to be reasonable according to the fashion it 
enjoined. 

‘ And so by the memory of all our best hours together, 
by the memory of every promise, every gracious word, 
every caress — in the name of the redemption you have 
worked in me, in my thoughts, ambitions, purposes — I im- 
plore you to put away the remembrance of this vile thing, 
in as far as it comes between us, cuts you off from me, 
keeps us apart. Because, my dearest, if you do not I 
cannot answer for myself. I used to be pretty well able to 
face the world alone. I can’t do so any longer. Without 
you the clue is lost, I have nothing to guide me, nothing to 
steer by. The last three days have been infernal. I dare 
not write, hardly dare think about them. They have been 
days of outer darkness. I fancied I knew what torment 
was, but it seems I did not. This was something new. I 
have no words for it — it was the abomination of desolation. 
For a while even Art herself was false to me, turned 
grotesque; mocked me, drawing aside her garments and 
showing me that under the goodly seeming of them was 
nothingness, vacancy, a strong delusion. Mary, no man 
has ever loved a woman more devoutly than I you. I 
must have you. By God, I will have you. See, across 
the distance you have put between us, I stretch out my 
arms to you. Dear love, you won’t have the heart to 
resist — you will hear, understand the greatness of my need, 
yield, forget. Already I hold you, see your eyes again, 
kiss your lips — then all is well. Short of that, oh, well, 
short of that — for loving as I love you no less than that, 
no compromise, is possible — for me there remains only the 
abomination of desolation. So give way, my dear one — 
hear me, and forget.’ 

Shall we condemn Mary Crookenden as light-minded, 
wanting in strength of purpose, of moral stamina, be- 

E E 2 


The IVages of Sin. 


4^6 

cause, by the time she had finished reading Colthurst's 
letter, heart had gained over head, because she ceased 
struggling to discriminate between abstract right and 
wrong in an all-compelling awareness of her lover’s 
desperate need of her ; because, in short, the great god 
once more conquered, came into possession of his own 
again ? Human nature being what it is, and we ourselves, 
excellent reader, being after all, you know, but human, 
had best perhaps be silent, cover our mouth. 

Getting up, clasping her hands behind her, the letter 
in them, she began walking backwards and forwards 
across the room; first the warm firelight, then, as she 
turned, the wan, pensive light of the autumn morning 
alternately touching her figure. 

* Yes, I will give way/ she answered, out loud. 4 1 
understand. I will try to forget.' 

And then, once having yielded, the longing to relieve 
his suspense, to shorten the time of his probation, took 
possession of Mary Crookenden. She went back to the 
window — if it was not too wet she would go out now 
quickly, by herself, go up to the post-office in the village, 
telegraph to him at once. 

But though the rain was not heavy, Mary left the 
window hastily, in consternation, for, walking up the 
carriage-drive, his long black mackintosh shiny from 
the damp, was no less a person than Mr. Aldham him- 
self. And the sight of him, at this particular moment, 
was particularly jarring to Miss Crookenden. To cross 
the hall with a view to going upstairs, she must pass 
the front door, so it appeared safer to stay where she 
was. Fortunately the Rector was out. But Aldham’s 
near neighbourhood made her extremely nervous, all 
the same; for it brought keenly before her the most 
unsatisfactory episode in her experience. On the face 
of it she had behaved badly to Mr. Aldham, had made 
a fool of him. He was not precisely the kind of person 
who relishes being made a fool of ; and on parting with 
her he had permitted himself to tell her quite plainly 
his opinion of her behaviour. His remarks had been 
extremely pungent. Mary reddened at the mere recollec- 
tion of them. The events of the last week had been 


The Wages are Paid. 


421 


sad enough, heaven knows, but they at least had been 
dignified ; and there was something very distasteful, 
displeasing to her in having these other inglorious 
recollections — not only of Mr. Aldham's speeches, but of 
all the strife of tongues that had arisen around her broken 
engagement, and of all that odious business of returning 
her wedding presents — revived just now. It seemed to 
vulgarize the present, to cheapen it. Mary stood on the' 
tiger-skin rug, full of resentment, her hands behind her 
still clasping Colthurst’s letter. 

In the long run, I suppose, we all really do what we 
like best; and on that hypothesis, Mr. Aldham unques- 
tionably liked doing what more malleable and less rigidly 
self-opi mated persons would have voted highly embarrass- 
ing and disagreeable. For after a very short delay, the 
study door was opened and the servant ushered him into 
the room. 

Aldham had preserved the gift of extracting all personal 
and related meaning from his expression, and presenting 
himself to you as a chilly abstraction. He might have been 
meeting Miss Crookenden for the first time. The effect 
was neither pleasant or reassuring. He bowed on enter- 
ing the room, came within speaking distance, delivered 
himself of his business deliberately, with unbending 
severity of manner. 

1 1 find Mr. Crookenden is out/ he said. { I therefore 
think it best to speak directly to you. This will save time, 
and in the present case time is of importance. I come in 
the interests of one of my parishioners/ 

Mary inclined her head in acknowledgment of this speech. 
If he was cold, she at least could be cold too — all the same 
her cheeks were burning. The position appeared to her 
singularly ungraceful. 

* I was called in early this morning to a woman who, 
apparently, is dying. She informs me that you are ac- 
quainted with her and with her unfortunate career. She 
is most desirous to see you, as she has something to com- 
municate to you which — so she says — it is impossible for 
her to mention to any but yourself. She has been away 
from Beera for many years. She is a daughter, I learn, of 
the Dissenting lobster-catcher, William Parris/ 


422 


The Wages of Sin . 


Mary could not help herself — it hurt too much — she gave 
a sort of imploring cry. The severity of Aldham’ s bearing 
suffered no diminution. His lips were tightly compressed, 
his light blue eyes as hard as steel. He told himself he 
was acting rightly, acting as the priest is bound to act, 
letting no private considerations interfere with the duty 
he owes to a member of his flock. He told himself he 
suffered acutely. He did not add that revenge is sweet. 
It took Mary some moments to recover herself, during that 
time he waited silent. 

'You have alluded to — to this woman’s unfortunate 
career/ the girl said at last, in proud desperation. ' Do 
you know what it has been ? ’ 

* In part, yes/ Aldham answered calmly. 

' Then surely you must see, you must understand that 
I cannot hold any communication with her. To ask me to 
do so is to insult me, Mr. Aldham.’ 

The young clergyman’s delicate face grew scarlet, but 
he retained self-possession. 

' That, pardon me, is beside the mark/ he replied. ' This 
unfortunate woman, Jane Parris, is in very poor circum- 
stances, deserted by the person upon whom she has the 
strongest claim, she is mortally ill. Her case is a lament- 
able one ; and I, as her pastor, am under the obligation, 
at whatever cost to myself, to do what I can to mitigate her 
suffering. She entreats to see you, Miss Crookenden ; and 
I own it appears to me, that far from its being impossible 
you should accede to her request, she has a peculiar right 
to your consideration. Since she has expressed the wish, 
expressed it most earnestly I may add, I do not myself com- 
prehend how you can conscientiously refuse to gratify it.’ 

Again Aldham waited silently, while in Mary Crookenden 
a rather agonizing battle went forward. For it was cruel, 
cruel, surely, that just now when her whole spirit was 
molten, so to speak, by the passion of those concluding 
sentences of Colthurst’s letter, she should be called to per- 
form this tremendous act of self-abnegation. She began to 
walk up and down again, her head bent, her eyes fixed 
upon the ground, the room very still save for the dragging 
rustle of her gown, the crackle of the fire, the swish of the 
rain against the window. 


The Wages are Paid. 


423 


And Aldham, not without an unconscious but very actual 
satisfaction, watched her, registering the progress of the 
battle. Depend upon it, the view of human nature which 
sees in Inquisitors nothing but monsters of brutality and 
iniquity is an uncommonly crude one. Most acting mem- 
bers of the Holy Office, I fancy, were extremely fine 
gentlemen whose intellectual and moral sense was ex- 
quisitely well-trained. 

At length the girl stopped ; and Aldham had to own that 
the stately quality of her beauty had never been more 
notable than in this moment of humiliation and defeat. 

1 Please tell Jane Parris she may expect me this after- 
noon — that is, if it is not inconvenient to you to give her 
a message,’ she said. 

1 Not in the least. But I should fail in discharging my 
mission unless I stated that she expresses the greatest 
anxiety to see you some time before to-day's post goes out.’ 

Then Mary began to gauge the greatness of the sacrifice 
that would be demanded of her. She flinched, would 
have prayed for mercy, perhaps, had any one but Cyprian 
Aldham been the bearer of this call upon her courage. As 
it was she answered him calmly. 

' In that case I need not trouble you with any message. 
I will order the carriage at once, and shall reach Beera 
sooner than you will/ 

She went towards the door, Aldham moved too, opened 
it, held it open for her. Mary bowed as she passed, but 
without looking at him. And Aldham told himself once 
more he had suffered acutely during this conversation. 

1 But I did right in speaking, in not sparing myself/ he 
added. 1 1 did quite right/ 

And later that same morning, Mary Crookenden, the 
purest, most gracious instincts of her womanhood called 
forth by the irresistible appeal of poverty, sickness, the on- 
coming of the mystery of death, knelt on the uneven, 
worm-eaten floor beside Jenny’s testerless bed, listened 
to her husky, gasping speech and answered her very 
gently. 

‘ I thought on the grapes and the glass of water/ Jenny 
said, 1 1 knew you were like that, when you heard how 
bad I was you’d come. There’s not many of your sort 


424 


The Wages of Sin . 


as 'ud do it, but I reckoned you would, because of that 
glass of water.’ 

' Yes,’ Mary murmured, soothingly ; ' yes/ 

' Dying’s a poor enough tale, anyway,’ Jenny went on ; 
' but it’s most past bearing, when you have to go all 
alone, with the curse on you of the one you’ve loved best. 
I know I ought to set my thoughts on the Lord, and so I 
do. But somehow your heart turns back, spite of you. 
And Jim's very strong — nothing don’t frighten you much 
when he’s by. You know all about that.’ 

* Yes,’ Mary Crookenden murmured again. 'Ah, yes.’ 

' Poor, dear soul,’ Jenny gasped. ' It’s pretty rough on 
you, too. But you’ll make him forgive me ? You’ll let 
me see him again, for certain ? ’ 

And once more Mary assented. Then Jenny raised her- 
self a little, spoke with a tremulous haste. 

4 Only you’ll make him understand he’s bound to come 
on the quiet, when father’s out to sea, because he’s mad 
against Jim for the scandal he holds he's brought on 
the place along of me. Aunt Sarah Jane is always tellin’ 
what he says he’ll do to him if he ever shows his face in 
Beera town.’ 

Jenny sank back upon her poor pillows. 

1 And God knows, I’d rather go unforgiven, sooner go 
without ever setting eyes on him again, though it 'ud be 
awful hard, than that any harm should overtake him.’ 

Jenny smiled a little to herself. 

'Jim’s too good to waste,’ she said. 

But that smile touched the limit of Mary’s power of en- 
durance. For this woman’s unconquerable pride in, un- 
conquerable belief in James Colthurst — a pride and belief 
rivalling her own, yet divided from it by so frightfully 
different a past — was positively staggering to her reason. 
That roads, distinct as those leading upward to paradise, 
down into the abyss, should reach precisely the same 
end ; — that she — she, Mary Crookenden, proudly clean 
in mind and body — that she and this poor dying pros- 
titute should share the same longing, the same faith, the 
same devotion — should find their deepest joy, their deepest 
sorrow in love of the same man — was too bewildering a 
revelation of equality, of the brotherhood which, despite all 


The Wages are Paid. 


425 


our placings of higher and lower, still binds human beings 
together with bonds stronger than class or creed, stronger 
than vice and virtue, strong as life and death itself. Mary 
felt she must go, escape, must be by herself, silent, alone 
with the sad sweet music of the great Earth-Mother out in 
the wind and the wet, or she would have no power left 
to face what remained yet to be done of this strange day’s 
work. 

She rose from her knees, but the sick woman perceiving 
her intention, caught feebly at a fold of her dress. 

'You’m coming to see me again?* she gasped. 'The 
others is always on about Jim and his wickedness till I’m 
fairly mazed with their clack. You’m the only one as 
know, as comprehend. And then you’re very good to look 
at, like the sun, shining and lighting up this poor place. 
God bless you ; I never thought to live to say that.* 

And so Colthurst’s letter was answered. Not telling 
him his love would return ; not bidding him seek his 
love. But bidding him hasten, put aside work, put aside 
anger and vengeance, forget past injuries, past offences, 
journey down to Beera Mills and comfort Jenny Parris 
as she lay on her death-bed. 


Chapter V. 

The last of the tan-sailed herring-boats had rounded the 
pier-head and sailed out into the wide bosom of the Bay, and 
the night — tranquil, mild, starlit— had closed down upon 
the woods and sea and the little white-walled town, when 
the Rector and James Colthurst crossed the silent Square 
and went up the steps leading on to the narrow, cobble- 
paved platform before William Parris’s cottage at the edge 
of the cliff. The rush of the stream in the gulley answered 
the beat of the surf on the beach as it had done any night 
there many hundred years. The air was still, sound 
carried. Now and again the voices of the fishermen, 


426 


The Wages of Sin. 


calling to one another as they shot the herring-nets, came 
from far across the great plain of water, weird in effect, 
wild as the cry of beings of another age and race. 

Colthurst heard them with the same vividness of appre- 
hension with which he heard and saw everything to-night. 
His senses were preternaturally acute ; were flayed, so to 
speak, offering a surface all quick to the lightest touch. 
He divined, moreover, with a kind of naked distinctness, 
what passed in the minds of those about him. For him 
the veils were withdrawn, the merciful veils which blunt 
perception and so help to keep us sane. To all those who 
are really alive, saint, sage, artist alike, each on their 
several lines, this condition is common at moments. It 
may be enchanting. It may be hideous. Perilous it 
must always be ; for it oversteps the workable limits of 
human powers. In it the spirit breaks bounds, ceases to 
be conditioned, gets quite too close to the essence of 
things for personal safety. And so, in desperation, if it 
be a spirit finely-tempered and of noble quality, is driven 
to take refuge in the prayer, in which fortitude and sanity 
grapple an immense terror of ruin and eternal failure — 
the prayer 1 let me not be confounded.’ 

And now as Colthurst stood before the old, red-cob 
cottage overlooking the sleeping village, fatalist though he 
was, that prayer rose to his lips. For the place was thick 
with memories, and memories are precious bad company. 
If evil memories, wholly bad. If sweet memories, bad 
company still; since what they speak of is gone and lost 
to us, useful only for the further furnishing of that House 
of Regrets, for which in youth we bake the bricks, of 
which in manhood we build the walls, wherein, in old age, 
we live. And so Colthurst paused a little, to steady him- 
self and fight down the fear of confusion that haunted him, 
glancing in that rapid, quietly violent way of his, at the 
great dark V of the hillsides meeting in the bottom of the 
gulley immediately below — at the vast pallid expanse of 
the sea — at the overarching dome of sky, a shade darker 
than the sea, a shade lighter than the land, a web of fine 
mist drawn across it tempering the radiance of innumerable 
stars. Lastly he glanced at the light in the cottage window, 
just above him, up under the thatch. 


The Wages are Paid. 


42; 


Inside the cottage, awaiting him were realities more 
searching, after all, than any memories. Colthurst walked 
on to the far end of the platform, guarded by a broken 
paling, and looked down on to the beach some fifty feet 
beneath. He must give himself a trifle more time; he 
could not trust himself to meet those realities just yet. 

For the light in the window symbolized that which had 
marred his career, crossed his high ambitions, drained away 
his strength like a running sore all these last eleven years. 
He had struggled against it, concealed it, defied the pain 
of it ; made himself a name, a position, something approach- 
ing a fortune even, in spite of it. For the James Colthurst 
of to-day and the James Colthurst who had sat on the sea 
wall there below eleven years back were two very different 
men. Yet the symbol remained a true one, representing a 
constant quantity in his thought, a constant impediment to 
his • freedom of action. And now the last scene of the 
long tragedy the symbol stood for was to be played out ; 
to be played out, complicated by the — to him — profoundly 
ironical fact, that the honour and delight of his life had 
turned advocate for the disgrace of his life — Mary Crooken- 
den turned advocate for Jenny Parris. 

And as he stood looking down at the dimly seen beach 
thinking of all this, trying to overcome the bitterness it 
raised in him, he recalled, somehow, with singular distinct- 
ness that old boyish dream of his — of falling, falling ever- 
lastingly through space from off the edge of Saturn's 
luminous ring ; recalled the strange hallucination which had 
overtaken him, here, the night of Jenny's birthday party — 
the day he first saw Mary Crookenden ; recalled the high 
staircase window of the Connop School, the asphalt pave- 
ment, the chirping, impudently observant sparrows. And 
then the dark boulder-strewn beach seemed to call aloud to 
him, above the boom of its slow breaking waves and the 
grate of its pebbles, of rest and of emancipation — to call not 
as tempting him, but as promising that endurance should not 
fail or go unrewarded. And somehow that grim promise 
was very grateful to Colthurst. Sent him back to Kent 
Crookenden — who waited a few paces off digging the point 
of his walking-stick into the mould between the up-stand- 
ing cobbles — braced and steadied. Let the realities be 


428 


The Wages of Sin. 


what they might he dared meet them, since behind them 
all, be they never so confounding, he caught sight of the 
form of the great deliverer, the great peace-maker, the 
friend to be counted on, who never fails any one of us — 
Death, * delicate death.' 

‘ I am quite ready now, Mr. Crookenden,’ he said. 1 Let 
us go in.’ 

The gloomy cottage kitchen, long and low as the cabin 
of a vessel. A heavy, fusty odour of lumber, old nets, 
disused lobster-pots, the accumulated dirst and rubbish 
of many years of none too dainty house-keeping. Miss 
Crookenden’s mulatto nurse, her swarthy profile and gay- 
coloured turban-like cap catching the light as she bent 
down tending the lire. Then the little cramped, turning 
staircase — the steps of it crumbling from dry-rot — which 
creaked complainingly beneath Colthurst’s rapid tread. 
The open stair-head where Bill Parris slept, divided from 
the inner room by a thin wooden partition. — Dot slept 
there to-night, and the child started and turned in her sleep 
as he passed her. — The wooden partition is cut off straight 
along the top, leaving a vacant space of some two feet in 
the middle under the ridge beam of the • roof. The door 
has no lintel to it, and its big wooden latch is lifted by a 
knotted string from without. Colthurst, alas, had lifted 
that latch before now ; knew the passing resistance it 
offered when swelled, as to-night, by recent damp ; knew 
the groan of the rusty hinges, as with its yielding the door 
swung back. 

And then the room within. — For an instant all reeling 
together, every object in it ringed round by half the 
colours of the prism, then straightening back into place 
again, and presenting a picture of every smallest acces- 
sory of which he was vividly sensible. — The downward 
sweep of the raftered roof to the low side walls from 
off which the paper peeled in mouldy strips. The un- 
curtained window, directly before him in the triangle of 
the gable. On the right the large low bed with its 
unsightly sawn-off posts at the four corners. And to-night 
over and around that bed, and thrown up on to the 
raftered roof by the candle set on the sea-chest under the 
window, women's shadows, shifting, crossing one another, 


The Usages are Paid. 


429 


oddly deformed and distorted. And Colthurst, in his 
present condition of clairvoyance, forced to see those 
women with unsparing clearness of vision, to comprehend 
the relation of each to her companions, and, still worse, 
her relation to himself — to comprehend it in the full 
breadth of its incongruity, in its glaring divergence from 
the ordinary lines of social intercourse, in the dislocating 
moral problems it involved. 

First — because of least consequence — Mrs. Kingdon, 
William Parris’s sister, mother of Jenny’s old sweetheart. 
Colthurst remembered her perfectly, had never liked her, 
did not like her now. A decent, dismal person, with a 
worried forehead and eyes at once sly and devout. A 
person of many trials richly enjoyed. She was engaged — 
Colthurst knew it, and it irritated him exquisitely — in enjoy- 
ing the present trial to the uttermost, as she sat by the 
bedside, in black gown and all-round linen apron, with 
her little air of conscious forgiveness of many injuries 
received, wiping the moisture from Jenny's forehead or 
her parted lips. 

Then Jenny herself — lying half over on her right side, 
the form of her body from shoulder to foot plainly out- 
lined beneath the thin bed-clothes and old patch-work 
quilt. Her hair drawn away from her face and the nape 
of her neck, in a dark tangled mass, across the crumpled 
pillow. Her breath coming irregularly in panting, weas- 
ing sobs. Jenny — he knew that, too — stronger here on 
her sick bed to affect his future, nullify his dearest hopes, 
than she had ever been in health. And if Jenny dying 
was thus strong, what might not be the strength of Jenny 
dead ? Only by a tremendous exercise of will could 
Colthurst check his thought, hold under his imagination, 
refuse to look ahead. But he checked it, held it under ; 
for very sufficient to the present hour was the evil thereof. 

And lastly, seen as across some wide blank space, in- 
accessible, far removed, Mary Crookenden, a strange 
inmate of this poverty-stricken place. Her back was 
towards the candle as she stood by Mrs. Kingdon, shaking 
out the folds of a clean, soft towel. And to Colthurst it 
seemed that a sort of greyness covered her, making her 
figure much less positive and tangible, than the crooked 


430 


The Wages of Sin . 


shadow thrown up on to the raftered roof. And as he came 
forward to the foot of the bed he saw her eyes close, 
saw her lay hold of the top of the sawn-off bed-post, 
knew that for the moment she suffered actual physical 
pain. — Ah ! these realities were much worse than 
memories, no doubt about that. — And seeing, knowing 
all this, he sickened with an agony of remorse for the 
bitterness of the experience which his love of her, her 
love of him, was bringing her. His letter of three days 
ago appeared to him an enormity of egotism. He ought to 
have accepted her first recoil from him, after learning the fact 
of Jenny and Dot’s existence. The subsequent appeal he 
had made to her was weak, unworthy, hysterical. Truly 
loving her, he ought to have let her go once and for all, go 
while the freshness of disgust and anger were upon her, 
and so saved her this present grief. It was not Jenny lying 
there dying whom he hated now, not Jenny whose doings 
were unforgiveable, but his own. And Colthurst hated 
himself, hated himself with an absorbing blackness of 
hatred for the way in which — as it seemed to him — he had 
dragged this beautiful woman down to his own low level ; 
doing, in his unpardonable selfishness, the very thing 
which but a few months back he had scorned to con- 
template — scorching not her feet only, but, as he feared, 
the very soul of her in the flames of his private hell. 

Then indeed he did come very near being confounded. 
For even death, unless death meant extinction, offered, 
so he thought, but doubtful refuge ; since while conscious- 
ness remained, it seemed to him the face of Mary 
Crookenden, as he saw it now with the greyness of 
sorrow upon it, must continue that of which he remained 
supremely, abidingly conscious, on and on, for ever. 

But the great god Love — dear Love — though we rail at 
him, and rightly — for the many evils he brings on our sad 
human race, has still his wholly excellent aspect, his wholly 
divine side. He is the father of many falls, of much 
weeping; but he is also the father of the most gracious 
deeds man’s history, written and unwritten, has to show. 

The creak of the crazy stairs under Colthurst’ s tread, the 
suck of the lifting latch, momentary oblivion of the truth 
during which her spirit had leapt up instinctively to greet 


The Wages are Paid. 


43 * 


him, were cruel to Mary Crookenden as the first incision 
of the surgeon’s knife cutting down into the quivering, 
shrinking flesh. But now as Colthurst looked full at her, an 
anguish of humiliation in his eyes, Mary lost sense of her 
own pain in the depth of her realization of his. By the 
quickened insight Love gives, comprehended and, in as far 
as might be, answered that prayer of his against being 
confounded ; met his eyes fearlessly, with a certain stately 
courage; even dared smile, gravely sweet. She spoke 
too, simply and to the point ; trying in fine self-abnega- 
tion to turn the current of his thoughts away from herself, 
towards the practical matter of Jenny’s piteous state. 

1 You are here just in ’time,’ she said, quietly. 1 We 
were almost afraid you might be too late. There has been 
another attack of hemorrhage, and it has left her very 
weak. But she will rally, I think. She will know you ; 
only we must spare her any shock. We had better stay 
till she moves before we tell her you have come.’ 

And thereupon Mrs. Kingdon, a little jealous of her 
sick-room supremacy, elected to intervene, bringing down 
sentiment with a run, as you may say, from the heights 
of somewhat extensive tragedy to the lowlands of dismal, 
domestic snugness. For Mrs. Kingdon was one of those 
oddly-constituted persons — they are to be found in every 
West Country village — who revel in personally conducting 
a death. They have the ritual of the ceremony at their 
fingers’ ends. Charon himself might take lessons from 
them as to the most professional fashion of handling the 
oar while ferrying departing souls across the dark river. 
But from one cause and another Mrs. Kingdon found 
the proper ritual vexatiously difficult to carry out in the 
present case. Miss Crookenden, notwithstanding her 
gentleness, impressed her not a little. What was the reason 
of her interesting herself so much in Bill’s poor, dis- 
creditable daughter ? For the life of her she could not 
make out. Her conscience, further, was extremely un- 
easy, although her vanity was extremely flattered, at being 
party to this secret visit of the common enemy, James 
Colthurst. What would Beera Town say when it came 
to know ? Mrs. Kingdon had a general sense of being 
unevenly yoked with unbelievers, of having, possibly, 


432 


The Wages of Sin. 


permitted herself to be made a cat’s-paw of by Satan 
himself. She sighed loudly and repeatedly, regarding 
Colthurst, meanwhile, obliquely out of the corners of her 
eyes ; and being a person of principle, struggled to be 
true to her own small system, notwithstanding inherent 
difficulties, and to conduct her niece out of this world 
according to established precedent. 

1 1 question if she will rally, Miss Crookenden/ she said, 
in a tone of complaint. 1 And if I was so as to follow my 
own sense as to it, I should rouse her up a bit. For 
we’m bound to own there’s signs of the end in plenty, and 
I hold it’s wicked to let any one — whatever they be — slip 
off without knowing they’m going.’ 

1 1 think she knows how ill she is just as well, probably 
better, than we do,’ Mary answered. 

Mrs. Kingdon sighed again, clasping her hands together 
upon her apron in the depression between her knees, and 
swaying herself to and fro from the waist. 

* The heart’s deceitful above all things,’ she observed ; 
'an’ desperately wicked, and Jenny’s given them she 
belongs to a sight of trouble pretty near ever since she 
was born ; and it ’ud be just of a piece with the rest if 
she was to slip off unawares without telling if she’s 
turned to the Lord. — And her poor dear father out to sea 
with Steve too, and not a creature to be able to tell mun 
whether his only daughter’s made her peace or not before 
she went.’ 

She debated inwardly how much further it might be 
safe to venture along the road of accredited ritual ; for, 
though her appreciation of the feelings of others was 
comfortably circumscribed, Colthurst as he stood there at 
right angles to her, had an effect of still violence about 
him which made him appear a rather unknown and alarm- 
ing being to invite to assist in the customary ceremonies 
of decease. All the more praiseworthy on her part, then, 
the effort to make him do his duty ! 

1 If I was in your place, sir, I wouldn’t reckon too much 
on any rallying,’ she said. ' I'd bring it home to her as 
she was goin’ for sure, and ask her about her state.’ 

In his present attitude of mind this suggestion struck 
Colthurst as almost devilishly ironical. 


433 


The Wages are Paid. 


1 W-would you, Mrs. Kingdon ? ’ he stammered. ‘ Your 
niece has known me in a good many characters before 
now, I r-regret to say ; but in that of father confessor 
she would hardly recognize me, I'm afraid. Sudden 
expressions of anxiety on my part, as to the state of 
her soul, m-might even seem to have an element of 
farce in them — h-here in this room — she lying on that 
bed.' 

But, indeed, there was no need to rouse Jenny, for at 
the sound of his rapid whispering speech, she moved, 
straightened herself, and doing so caught sight of him. 
And her face, pinched and disfigured by sharp phy- 
sical distress, softened, lighted up, grew young. By a 
strong effort she raised herself on both elbows, while 
her hair fell dark about her shoulders ; and she laughed, 
actually laughed from joy at seeing him, laughed out. 
Then would have spoken — welcomed, thanked, praised, 
blessed him in her old hopelessly-hopeful fashion ; but a 
term is set to laughter as to all else, and for Jenny 
that term was already fully reached. For her, the days 
of laughter were spent and over ; and so, rightly under- 
stood, this last laugh was but another added to the long 
list of her irremediable mistakes. It sent the blood 
welling up from her lacerated lungs, flowing down froir 
her poor laughing mouth over the bosom of her night- 
gown on to the sheet. 

‘Lord a’ mercy — 'tis the end for certain sure/ Mrs. 
Kingdon cried. 

And Mary Crookenden cried out, too. She could not 
prevent herself, the sight was too heart-rending. Then, 
compelled by a very storm of pity, murmuring incoherent 
words of comfort such as one murmurs over a child that is 
hurt, she bent over Jenny trying to sop it up with the 
towel and hide this horror of blood 

But Colthurst took the towel from her, put her at once 
fiercely yet tenderly aside. For that Mary Crookenden’s 
person, or, indeed, the hem of her garment, should come 
to be stained by that red tide, seemed to him the culmina- 
ting grossness, indignity, disgrace, of the relation of these 
two women to himself. 

4 N-no/ he stammered, ‘ no, you can’t, you mustn’t d-do 


434 


The Wages of Sin. 


that. It passes the limits. It is my b-business, Mary, 
mine only — not yours/ 

And then, while Mrs. Kingdon laid Jenny back upon 
the pillows, Colthurst, taking the bit of sponge and the 
little, cracked, brownish-white pudding basin of tepid 
water from off the chair by the head of the bed, knelt down 
beside her. Set his teeth hard, and in that deft, unerring 
fashion of his, washed her lips, chin, and throat, turned 
back the neck of her night-dress in front to hide that ugly 
soil, helped to administer such remedies as were to be had. 

And for a while Mary Crookenden watched, but she 
could not watch for very long. Her eyebrows drew to- 
gether, and the chill pride came back into her bearing. 
Pity gave place to an irresistible uprush of personal 
feeling, even of class feeling. The natural woman in 
Mary was affected by jealousy and resentment ; the fine 
lady in her by social prejudice, by dainty disdain. For it 
was almost intolerable to her to see Colthurst minister 
thus to his former mistress ; to see the hands she loved 
and in the consummate skill of which she gloried — the 
hands that had painted famous pictures — the hands whose 
touch had wakened in her knowledge of the splendour of 
living for those who dare sing the 'Song of the Open 
Road ’ — to see these hands busied in repulsive, menial, 
sick-room offices, holding a little cracked pudding basin, 
wringing out a bloody sponge. The girl turned away 
with a lift of her fair head and a rustle of silk-lined 
skirts over the uneven floor, pushed the small casement 
window wider open, looked out, deeply stirred, deeply 
angered, into the mild autumn night. For at Colthurst 
she dared not look any longer, lest feeling should master 
self-control, lest she should call out to him haughtily and 
command him to stop. And as she breathed the sweet 
night-air, heard the babble of the stream in the gulley, the 
roar of the slow breaking waves and the hiss of the surf 
on the beach, Mary repented for the moment, of her own 
self-abnegation. Why had she yielded to the sick woman’s 
entreaty, why had she bidden him come? To her it 
appeared that she had been guilty of the folly of being 
righteous over much. 

And Colthurst noted her every movement; read, plainly, 


The Wages are Paid. 


435 


as though it was set down in very big print, what she felt ; 
knew that the crisis he had warded off so many times, the 
decision which he had so often eluded, was upon him, 
relentless, absolutely unavoidable at last. With Mary’s 
change of attitude Colthurst’s had, in a measure, changed 
also. He no longer feared being confounded, no longer 
was aware of self-abasement. The pace was growing too 
hot for all that. He could not reflect, he could only act. 
And bn his action during the next couple of hours — for 
the bleeding had nearly ceased, the end would not be yet 
— depended all his future. He foresaw that action must 
determine, irrevocably for this life, to which he belonged, 
which woman conquered, won, owned him — Jenny Parris, 
his fellow-sinner, his comrade of evil days, peasant, model, 
harlot — or Mary Crookenden, beautiful, spotlessly pure, 
rich too in the good things of this world, the woman 
whom he supremely honoured and loved. 

Colthurst set his teeth harder; but he finished squeezing 
out the sponge, arranging the neck of the night-gown, 
folding under the stained corner of the sheet, before he rose 
and went back to his former station at the foot of the bed. 

And Jenny, meanwhile, was unconscious of the drama 
being played out around her. For though the hemorrhage 
ceased, the bitterness of death had come upon her, 
following hard on that last laugh ; and even when death 
wears a friendly aspect, that bitterness is often very 
great. For the soul could not easily free itself from that 
shapely, well- fashioned body of hers. It struggled to get 
loose, but the flesh held it back ; and Jenny groped with 
her hands on the bed-clothes, her eyes staring half open 
as at some sight of unearthly terror, — a rattling now and 
again in her throat, too, between the panting, choking 
breaths. 

The last sound was new to Mary Crookenden ; and it 
was very ghastly. She began to listen for it ; and each 
time it came she sickened and shuddered. She lost her 
count of time, as she listened ; minutes seemed lengthened 
into hours ; and that dreadful sound seemed to grow louder 
at each recurrence, louder than the rush of the stream, 
louder than the beat of the sea on the rocky beach. At 
length she could bear it no longer. She turned round, 


436 


The Wages of Sin. 


met Colthurst's eyes for an instant, looked away from him 
to the bed, came forward across the narrow space ; and 
hearing that sound, seeing, in the flickering candle-light, 
those groping, searching, clutching fingers, cried, half im- 
periously, half imploringly, to Sarah Jane Kingdon : — 

‘Ah! do something, do something to help her. It is 
cruel, heartless, to stand by seeing her misery and doing 
nothing to lessen it/ 

‘ My dear Miss, she’s past help from such as us , 1 the 
elder woman answered, in the tone of one very wrong- 
fully accused. ‘ Tis the Almighty’s ruling some should 
die hard, and it’s not for us to question but what all's 
according to mercy. I’ve seen worse passings than this, so 
that’s not what makes me fret. What troubles me is she’s 
not spoke up and told if she reckons she’s made her peace.’ 

Mrs. Kingdon shook her head and sighed heavily. Un- 
evenly yoked with unbelievers or not, she was resolved 
to bear testimony, to uphold disregarded ritual. 

‘ We’m bound to take all that’s laid upon us,’ she con- 
tinued. ‘But 'tis no end terrifying to the mourners when 
they don’t know if they’m free to think comforting thoughts 
of them they’ve lost. And her poor, dear father out to sea 
and all.’ 

She concluded with a reproachful, sidelong glance in 
the direction of Colthurst. 

But to the pious woman’s strictures he was, just then, 
quite indifferent, for Mary, after momentarily watching 
those sadly groping fingers again, turned to him, her 
lips trembling with emotion, an agony of sorrow, of 
relenting, of unstinted compassion in her face. She put 
up her hands, pressed them against her chest to keep 
down the dry sobs which almost stifled her. 

‘ Then you must do something,’ she said, her grave 
voice all broken. ‘You must help her, comfort her — oh ! 
you must — it’s so dreadful to leave her all alone with her 
suffering like this. And I — I won’t see — I won’t look — 
I’ll turn my back.’ 

And so the crisis was upon James Colthurst; the choice 
placed right there before him, immediate, final. And he 
knew that it was a real choice. He was free to take either 
one and reject the other, nothing compelling him thereto 


The Wages are Paid. 


43 7 


but his own will. The balance hung even. He was free 
to throw the weight into either scale, a§, he pleased, that 
should make it dip. 

For that piteous appeal of Mary Crookenden's, the 
childlike simplicity of the phrases in which she couched 
it, proved to him beyond all question that her love was 
intact still. Still she was his in heart. The cruel experi- 
ences of the last week had not really alienated her. Still 
all his dearest, highest hopes might be fulfilled, still he 
might have her as bride and wife. — The thing was as easy 
— well, as easy as lying. He had only to repudiate Jenny's 
moral claim on him, now at the eleventh hour, when 
he had so immensely much to gain, she but the doubt- 
fulest measure of good to lose by such repudiation. He 
had only to echo Mrs. Kingdon's statement and declare 
her beyond the reach of human help. — And after all — for 
Colthurst reasoned the matter out with his usual singular 
clear-headedness in presence of a searching situation — what 
positive assurance had he that she was not actually beyond 
the reach of such help ? How could he be certain that 
now, in extremis , the mists of death confusing every sense, 
the hands of death slowly, painfully, yet surely drawing 
apart and disentangling soul from body, Jenny remained 
capable of receiving consolation from any degree of ten- 
derness, either of word or caress, which he — Colthurst — 
might lavish upon her ? Might not his labour be all in vain ? 
Was it not little short of insane to contemplate bartering 
the joy of fruitful, honourable years stretching ahead, against 
this very questionable chance of succouring, solacing, easing 
the last hours of unruly, impossible Jenny Parris? 

And then he put the case to himself from Mary Crook- 
enden’s standpoint. He perceived that she was sadly 
wrought upon, tired, her calm courage nearly or quite 
exhausted. What right had he to try her further, expose 
her to more of this wretchedness ? If duties were about, 
wasn't it a plain enough duty to take her away from 
this miserable scene, and place her — where of right she 
belonged — far from these sordid, incongruous circum- 
stances? To-morrow Colthurst could trust his own 
clever, stammering tongue and the greatness of his love, 
to do all that was necessary — to soften remembrance of 


438 


The Wages of Sin. 


the events of to-night and appease any inconvenient 
workings of her conscience. He entertained small doubt 
but that he could plead his own cause so as to secure 
the mildest of verdicts. 

Yes — still, if he pleased, Mary Crookenden was his. 
And knowing that, he looked at her now, standing tall 
and fair under the ridge-beam of the raftered roof in the 
centre of the old, tumble-down, comfortless cottage 
bed-chamber, looked at her from head to foot, letting 
his glance rest on every graceful line, every gracious 
detail, drown itself in her tearful eyes, linger upon 
her lips — until passion waxed hot and his dark face 
flushed, while her actual surroundings seemed to him to 
fade, to be blotted out, and her figure to stand before 
him, naked, in all its maidenly loveliness, white as a pearl 
against a sheet of white flame. 

For the moment Colthurst’s brain reeled. The emotional 
side of his nature had full sway. He was reckless, mad, 
drunk. Then — since thanks to persistent effort, persistent 
struggle, spirit in the man during these twelve months had 
steadily gained over matter — then suddenly a great shame 
covered him. For it was not, surely, according to this gross 
pattern his love for Mary Crookenden had been conceived, 
brought forth, reached maturity ? Appetite, so far, had 
never got the better of chivalrous reverence even in a 
glance, hardly — and that is saying a very great deal, if 
said truthfully — hardly in a thought, since the opening day 
of term at the Connop School, when he had first found 
her name upon the students’ list. 

Colthurst put his hands over his eyes to shut out the 
vision, bowed his head. 

A silence, broken only by the laboured breathing of 
the dying woman. By the sanctimonious sighings of Mrs. 
Sarah Jane Kingdon. And — in singular contrast to these 
last — the solemn voice of the sea lamenting along the coast ; 
but lamenting as brave souls alone know how to lament 
for the mysterious sorrow that lies at the roots of being — 
acquiescent, without admixture of any sentimental self-pity, 
sternly faithful in the fulfilment of their appointed work. 

And that solemn voice brought good counsel. When 
Colthurst looked up he was sane. He had laid hold of 


The Wages are Paid. 


439 


the meaning of those tremendous sayings concerning the 
plucking out of the right eye, the cutting off of the right 
hand and the right foot ; and having laid hold of it, had 
made his choice — convinced that choice was best not only 
for himself but for the woman he worshipped — had deter- 
mined absolutely into which scale to drop the weight. 

1 Very well/ he said, quietly, ' so b-be it. 1 will help her, 
that is, in as far as I can. B-but a man cannot serve two 
m-masters/ 

He paused, for his stammer threatened to become 
ungovernable. 

4 Therefore farewell/ he went on, 1 farewell, Mary, my 
b-beloved. — And now go, in God's name, my dearest, go. 
For to have you waiting and watching here while I do and 
say what must pain, must almost insult you, what must 
desecrate, what may render abhorrent to you the thought 
of the love you have given me — t-that would be too much. 

• — G-go, while you can still pardon me for all the evil with 
which through me you have become acquainted; while 
you can still pardon the immensity of my self-seeking in 
approaching you, asking you to marry me, asking you to 
let me mingle the foul stream of my life with the clear 
stream of yours. Asking you — for, God forgive me/ 
Colthurst broke out fiercely, 4 as I see it all now it comes 
to nothing less than that, asking you to pay for my adora- 
tion by becoming, under the specious title of wife, the last, 
choicest, most precious, most costly offering I can make to 
my own desire/ 

So far he had looked down at the uneven, worm-eaten 
boards while he spoke ; now he raised his eyes to the 
girl's face. 

4 D-don't misunderstand me/ he said quickly. 4 1 don’t 
want to discredit marriage to you and make you think 
slightingly of it. To the pure all things are pure. And 
there are men as well as women to whom marriage is 
pure, honourable, altogether wholesome and cleanly/ — He 
glanced away at the low wide bed. — * B-but I am not 
among them. And therefore to me it would be the last 
refinement of self-indulgence/ 

He paused a moment, and then looked at Mary Crookenden 
once more, with a serenity which had a certain grandeur in it. 


440 


The Wages of Sin. 


* And so go, my beloved/ he said very gently — ' go, 
knowing that if souls can be saved you have done much 
to save mine — that if there is, as Christ preached, a life 
beyond this wherein man is at rest, rid for ever of the 
curse and burden, the fret and torment of sex, then you 
have done much to win that life for me by your love and 
your suffering. And so go, knowing that you have brought 
me nothing but good. Go, before I do anything further to 
pain you, before your love, as well as my poor discarded 
mistress, Jenny Parris, comes nearer lying dead.’ 

Colthurst moved forward, would have passed her, going 
round to the side of the bed. But Mary stopped him. 
She could not speak. But she put her hands on his 
shoulders, drew him towards her, kissed him on the mouth, 
— a kiss of renunciation, yet of faith, of strong encourage- 
ment and help. Then she let her arms drop at her sides, 
and with her face set like a flint, turned and went. 

‘ Fay, who ever heard and saw the like of that ? ’ Mrs. 
Kingdon gasped, greatly scandalized, under her breath. 

Colthurst walked straight on to the head of the bed. 
Sat down sideways against the sawn-off post, his back 
somewhat bent to avoid the low sweep of the raftered roof. 
He put his arms round Jenny, raised her softly, carefully, 
till her head rested on his shoulder where Mary's hand had 
rested but a few seconds ago. 

1 Jenny/ he stammered, * Jenny, poor, loyal soul, come 
back, and whether you've made your p-peace in higher 
quarters or not, at least let me make my peace with you 
before we too part.’ 


Chapter VI. 

Only in myth and legend do rods turn into roses. In 
everyday life they sternly and persistently, alas 1 remain 
rods. So it certainly appeared to Colthurst, as he leaned 
on the rickety paling, guarding the cobble-paved platform 
before William Parris’ cottage, in the chill of the autumn 
morning, and looked across Yeomouth Bay, to where, be- 
hind the swelling uplands of the distant moor, the dawn 


The Wages are Paid. 


441 


grew and spread — primrose, saffron, scarlet, crossed by long 
wisps of smoke-coloured cloud, fine as ' a woman’s hair. 
Over the leaden grey plain of water the herring-fleet 
slowly fared homeward ; all save one boat, which, some 
half-hour ahead of the rest, was already taking up its 
moorings within the shelter of the sickle-shaped pier. 

Mary Crookenden had gone' from him. Gone, as we 
know, with a kiss sacred and sweet ; and with her going 
Colthurst’s gracious vision of wedded-love had fled back 
through the gate of dreams from whence at first it 
came. And Jenny Parris had gone too. Gone with a 
blessing, which went far to cancel the old bad score. Gone 
along the shadowy, silent way which leads, so some tell us, 
to a land where the most lovely of dreams — with a differ- 
ence — come true. And now he waited till Mrs. Kingdon 
should have dressed Dot, and packed the child’s scanty 
wardrobe, and made her ready to start home with him to 
London, the gas, and glitter, and smoke, and stir of which 
she loved. 

Colthurst’s will was firm. His choice had been reasoned, 
voluntary, deliberate, final. He accepted the consequences 
of it unreservedly. But it would be absurd to pretend that he 
felt very elate. Rods were not changed to roses ; and the 
saying that virtue is its own reward, rightly understood, is 
a hard saying, not without an element of cynicism in it. No 
great wonder, therefore, that the future looked somewhat 
purposeless to him, neutral-tinted, dull and leaden as the 
sea spread out before him, whose furrowed surface the fair 
colours of the dawn as yet failed to touch. For it is no joke, 
depend upon it, for any child of Adam honestly, and in serious 
earnest, to turn monk. To extirpate 1 the eternal femi- 
nine ’ and all that term stands to cover — its pretty minor 
joys and tender distresses, its merriment, its charming 
follies, its delightful fertility in small solacements, its in- 
spiring revelations of unselfishness and high courage ; as 
well as its violences, vanities, cruelties, numberless seduc- 
tions, numberless delusions, unblushing lies and lusts. 
And yet, as Colthurst perceived — perceived with the same 
unsparing clearness of vision which had pursued him all 
that night — for a nature like his, half measures were in- 
tellectually and morally impossible. Le mieux est Vennemi 


44 2 


The Wages of Sin. 


du bien; and to rid himself of the evil it was necessary 
for him also to cast away the good. 

What, then, practically was left to live for ? An idea 
and a fact. Art on the one hand, Dot on the other. 

About the first he felt easy enough. For Art, as he 
reasoned, like Religion — like all the greatest ideas vouch- 
safed to us — lives by sacrifice, draws her vitality from the 
life-blood of her votaries. To secure her fulness of 
being and of splendour you can hardly — within the limits 
of sanity — sacrifice too much. She cares not a rush about 
the domestic happiness or material prosperity of those who 
devote themselves to her service. Rather does she drive 
them out into the wilderness, far from the common haunts 
of common, householding, money-making, uxorious, philo- 
progenitive man ; and there reveal her secrets in solitude, 
thirst, and hunger, amid bare rock and burning sand. 
And so, telling himself this, as to coming pictures, 
Colthurst’s mind was at rest. The extirpation of the 
eternal feminine, he fancied, would rather help than hinder 
alike their production and their intrinsic worth. 

And on the other hand Dot. — Ah ! Dot presented some- 
thing of a problem, for Colthurst held himself to be a 
strange sort of nursing mother for a very clever and rather 
naughty small girl. He permitted himself no sentimental, 
Sunday-school book illusions regarding the child and his 
relation to her. He foresaw collisions, embarrassments, 
practical difficulties in profusion. But they did not affect 
him much. Colthurst, in his present humour, accepted 
these consequences of his choice along with the rest. 

4 If I can only hold out/ he said to himself as he watched 
the widening dawn and the nearing herring-boats. 1 That’s 
all which really signifies. The truth is sad, incomparably sad. 
I always knew that. And to go on loving it, not flinching 
from it for all its sadness through years — I am in brutally 
good health now, so the years will probably be many — - 
well, it will be a tough enough piece of work. Yet it is worth 
while/ he added. * I’m sure I don’t know why — but that 
it is worth while, I don’t doubt. And so the one thing 
which signifies is to be able to hold out, decently, without 
whimpering or shirking, or making a show of one's sores, 
until death comes, at last, to close the account.’ 


The Wages are Paid. 


443 

Just then the rim of the sun’s disc cleared the swelling 
uplands of the distant moors, sending widening rays of 
light flashing up to the zenith, changing the smoke- 
coloured cloud to flame, making a path of glory across 
the waters of the Bay. A glad morning wind arose, 
and rushed down the valley from landward. And along 
with the wind, so it seemed to Colthurst, a Presence, at 
once benign and awful, swept by him, making the frail 
paling quiver under his hand, and the harsh grasses and 
withered sea-pinks rooted in the cliff side whisper and 
shudder oddly as it passed. 

Instinctively he turned to look up at the window ot 
the bed-chamber where Jenny’s corpse lay, the window in 
the gable up under the thatch. And turning, found Jenny’s 
father, William Parris, within a couple of yards of him — a 
savage yet majestic figure, in his rough fishing clothes, his 
blue eyes wild, the salt rime frosting his beard and snarling 
mouth. 

* Who be you ? ’ he cried. * What be doin’ here ? ’ — 
Then, in obedience to the fixed idea which possessed him, 
he broke out inconsequently : — 

1 Woe to the fulish virgins, woe to the rebellious daughters, 
and to them what leads mun captive wi’ lying words.’ 

‘ Woe enough,’ Colthurst thought, 1 God knows.’ 

But when he tried to answer, to quiet the man, to tell him 
that with Jenny, at all events, it was well, since, forgiving and 
forgiven, she had entered into rest, once again Colthurst’s 
tongue played him false. He was very tired. He stammered, 
stammered badly, could not articulate a single intelligible 
sentence. Stood dumb, in all the pathos of utter in- 
capacity either of explanation or self-justification, as far 
as speech went — his eloquence useless, his repentance, 
his sacrifice, his expiation doomed to silence, since his 
body thus in his extremity had turned traitor to his brain. 

Exactly what took place, neither Stephen Kingdon, 
who followed close behind, nor Kent Crookenden, who 
was coming up the steps from the Square — having re- 
turned from taking his niece home to Brattleworthy — can 
say. Whether the old man, maddened by Colthurst’s 
silence, actually struck him, or whether Colthurst, 
not choosing to defend himself, backing away from 


444 The Usages- oj Sin. 


his assailant, backed too far, Steve Kingdon does not 
know. But he knows this, that as he ran up and caught 
Bill Parris round the shoulders and hauled him off, the 
crazy paling cracked, gave — splintering right and left like 
so much matchwood, and Colthurst pitched right back 
over the cliff edge. For an instant his face caught the 
sunlight, as his body turned in the air; while with a great 
shout — which rang along the coast, and out across the 
tranquil Bay, and over the sleeping, white-walled town, 
and up into the windings of the wooded combe — a shout 
of triumph, of consummated warfare, of emancipation, 
of hope — that strong soul hailed Death, — the consoler, 
the restorer, * delicate Death } — sitting waiting for him 
just this side the white line of the slow-breaking waves on 
the pui pie-grey shingle fifty feet below. 

And that is why they dug two graves within the week, 
side by side, in the little churchyard half-way up the 
combe ; and why they flew the flags, down in Beera village, 
half-mast high. 


Epilogue. 

It is given to few to realize their ideals — to the few, not 
to the many. All the more soothing and refreshing, then, 
to let thought dwell awhile upon the happy state of those 
favoured few. 

And to begin with, the Council of the Con nop Trust 
School may claim to stand among those consolatory few. 
For it the days of doubt and misgiving, of sitting on the 
edges of official chairs, are over. It made much handsome 
mention of the great services rendered to the school by its 
late director, James Colthurst. Inserted the said mention, 
not without rhetorical flourishes, in the 1 minutes ’ of its 
meeting ; and promptly proceeded to fill the vacant post 
with a very safe, very innocuous, and very-much-married 
gentleman of conservative views and middle age. Realism 
and subversive tendencies have vanished from the Connop 
School. And Mr. Barwell has vanished also — has retired 


finally and permanently to the semi-detached villa and 
society of the gentle parrot-nosed sisters at Hampstead. 
Not that the incoming director wished to eject the under- 
master. He would gladly have retained his services. 
But no, Mr. Barwell could not stay — having held office 
under King Stork, he could not make up his mind to hold 
office under any King Log again. It was foolish of the good 
man. The work would have been light; under the new 
regime he might have drum-doodled along in the easiest 
possible fashion. But the spectacle of Colthurst’s tre- 
mendous vitality had fascinated him; and to him the Connop 
School, without that spectacle, was a little too melancholy. 
He could not stand it. 

And next, among the consolatory few, we may number 
that extremely pretty little person, somtime Violet Winter- 
botham. For several winters now, both at the Hunt 
Ball at Slowby and the Bachelors’ Ball at Tulling- 
worth, she has appeared dazzling, dimpling, most decora- 
tive of dormice, in all the Aldham family diamonds. 
The year after his nephew's engagement came to such a 
very lame conclusion, Sir Reginald, still inconsolable for 
his wife’s death and in lively search of consolation, hap- 
pened to meet the Winterbothams at Homburg. Lady 
Sokeington, nee Barking, says she can’t conceive how any 
girl can quite make up her mind to marry a man three 
times as old as herself. But adds that — ‘darling 
Vi always was wonderfully sensible, and that it is 
too delightful for words to have her settled just next 
door, as you may say, in Midlandshire ; and that the son 
and heir is quite the trottiest of trots. And, of course, 
young Mr. Crookenden was really more than slow and 
tiresome about his affair. And then, after all, his father 
was only a Bristol shopkeeper — merchant ? — oh, well it’s 
very much the same thing, after all — though his mother is 
tidily connected ; so clearly this marriage is infinitely the 
nicer of the two. And dear Sir Reginald is more than 
off his head about her ; Vi is quite the love of his life, 
one can see that. And then there is something very touching 
about being an old man’s darling ; and if Vi doesn't mind 
the disparity, why really nobody else need worry about it, 
at least that is what she, Lady Sokeington, thinks/ 


446 


The Wages of Sin. 


And little Dot may be reckoned among the consolatory 
few, also, for she seems to be in a fair way to attain her 
ideal. She danced, not at the Slowby Hunt Ball last 
Ch istmas in diamonds, like young Lady Aldham, but at 
the Covent Garden pantomime, in the most delightfully 
abbreviated of skirts and the gayest of tinsel, which regarded 
from a certain level is every bit as useful and meritorious 
a proceeding. She wore wings, actually wings like a 
butterfly's, with great gilt-paper eyes on them. It was 
enchanting, heavenly. And Mr. Snell, of Shepherd’s Bush, 
made himself a positive nuisance by the vigour of his ap- 
plause in the topmost gallery. Other and more influential 
persons than the enthusiastic Snell remarked the little girl’s 
performance also ; with consequences, for it was evident 
the child, small and light-made as she is, has real talent. 
And so, although — as Mrs. Prust loses * no opportunity of 
informing all whom it may or may not concern — 1 there is 
no need for the poor little mortal to work for her living, 
because even if she hadn’t a little something of her own, 
which she has, she — the speaker — and Capt’n Prust have 
plenty enough to provide for her,’ it is probable Dot will 
dance her way through the world ; and that her name, 
before long, will come to figure in play-bills, and her quaint, 
shrewd, able, little face in photographers’ windows and the 
pages of dramatic journals. Let no one be alarmed. Mrs. 
Prust will prove a capable guardian of her morals ; and 
neither Dot’s heart or head are of the same quality as her 
mother’s. She is not of the sort who make shipwreck. 
She is too clever ; shall we add she is not sufficiently 
generous-natured ? For, though possibly the admission 
is a dangerous one in some of its aspects, it does un- 
deniably take a rather superb generosity to throw yourself 
away according to the superabundantly reckless fashion of 
poor Jenny Parris. 

And mention of photographic studios suggests further 
thought of Cyprian Aldham. For that gentleman’s deli- 
cate, fine-featured countenance is conspicuous just now in 
the large window in the Strand, from behind the plate 
glass of which — set in little rows, both clothed in the full 
canonicals of their respective professions — celebrated 
comedians and celebrated ecclesiastics look forth side by 


The Wages are Paid. 


447 


side, with a millennial harmony that, as one fancies, might 
prove rather startling to the fathers of the Early Church. 
Mr. Aldham, after some years of really admirable London 
mission work, has been offered — so the Guardian announces 
— and has accepted the newly-created Indian bishopric of 
Munipur and Gowhatty. No doubt he will do laudable 
service there to the Anglican Communion. As to the 
future of Cyprian Aldham likewise, no fears need be 
entertained. 

But how about the goodly youth Lance ; is he fated to 
realize his ideal or not? That is precisely what Mrs. 
Crookenden would be so extremely obliged if any one would 
tell her. She still regards her niece Mary from the point of 
view of disapproval. But her disapproval runs on quite 
other lines than the old ; for it is the young lady’s con- 
stancy rather than her tendency towards new and surpris- 
ing departures which now so greatly vexes her aunt. Is 
Lancelot to be kept waiting for ever? Mrs. Crookenden 
asks. 

And Lancelot himself cannot answer that question. 
He only knows he cannot change. How on earth can you 
change when you have felt just the same ever since you 
can remember? And therefore perhaps — though Polly is 
so awfully good and kind to him and seems so willing to 
have him on hand to look after her and do her odd jobs, 
that he can’t help sometimes being a little encouraged 
about it all — perhaps it would be wiser to make up his 
mind that he will always have to wait. This was what he 
told Lady Calmady when last he talked the matter over 
with her, walking up and down the broad southern terrace 
at Brockhurst, which overlooks the sloping paddocks where 
the dainty-limbed yearling fillies feed, the stately avenues 
of elm and lime, and the dark ridges of the fir forest. Lady 
Calmady spoke comfortably to him, smiling at him with 
her delightful smile — for she and her husband have a very 
true fondness for the goodly youth — telling him to wait 
yet a while longer and then take heart of grace. 

And Mary ? She has disappeared from the smart world, 
and from the world of art as well, for the last few years. 
Vague rumours of her come from distant quarters. Ever- 
shed and his wife caught a glimpse of her at Cairo. And 


448 


The Wages of Sin. 


about fifteen months later, Horatio Deland, the Thought- 
Reader — who is making a tour of the world to collect per- 
fectly reliable information for that new and very illumina- 
ting association known as the S.R.E.S.O.I. --in a letter to 
Adolphus Carr, mentioned that he was almost certain it 
was she whom he met in the gateway of a temple at Tokio, 
one day in early summer, when the fruit-trees were all in 
bloom. Kent Crookenden has been travelling with her. 
He put in a locum Unens at Brattleworthy — a diligent, 
praiseworthy young cleric, who, it may be mentioned in 
passing, calls increasingly often at Slerracombe House, 
furnished with an increasing amount of interesting parochial 
business, the detail of which he finds it increasingly ne- 
cessary to discuss with that best of good-hearted young 
women, Carrie. 

Madame Jacobini remains in the little blue house in St. 
George's Road. For, as she said to Kent Crookenden : — 

i I really am too old to live in my boxes, and be on view 
and equal to the situation, morning, noon, and night. A 
woman who respects herself and other people's eyes will 
go into retirement for a large number of hours out of every 
twenty-four, if she is wise, when the grand climacteric has 
come within sight. Travelling brings out all the weak 
spots in one’s looks, manners, and temper. No, thank 
you, the tax on one’s own vanity and one's neighbours’ 
forbearance is too severe. And, moreover, Mary will be 
just as well away from me. We women are invariably too 
intimate when we care for each other. We relax each 
other's tongues, under thcplea of communion and sympathy, 
and encourage each other to say a thousand and one things 
that had better be left unsaid.’ 

Madame Jacobini made a small grimace. Her tears 
were rather near the surface somehow. 

* We enervate each other abominably/ she went on. 
1 Carry the dear child off, and keep her from me till the 
wound has healed a little — poor darling.’ 

And so, troubled by a spirit of rather cruel unrest, our 
proud milk white maiden wandered away, as so many another 
before her has wandered, trying to cheat sorrow by change 
of place. Wandered through the magic East, mother of 
religions, mother of countless millions of human worshippers. 


The M \iges are Paid . 


449 


Wandered on to tropic islands lying like jewels on the bosom 
of the summer sea. And on again till East turns West, and 
ancient civilizations gave place to civilizations that count 
fewer years than the others count centuries. From Asia, 
ripe to rottenness, to America, crude often to commonness ; 
yet rich with the promise of the days to come, as the former 
is rich with the splendour of days that are past. While 
more than once during her wanderings, the turn of a sen- 
tence suddenly heard, the tone of a voice, a rapid gesture, a 
figure momentarily caught sight of on railway station, or 
steamer-deck, in crowded eastern bazaar or equally 
crowded western street, has made the girl’s heart stand 
still, and the blood leave her lips, with the ache of longing 
for what has been and is not. And then the unrest, which 
might have seemed for a space in abeyance, has seized her 
again, bidding her wander further, further yet, on her 
pilgrimage after a lost good. For that is the worst of the 
wages of sin. Sinners cannot pay them all — however will- 
ing, however passionately desirous even they may be to do 
so. Those wages are always paid in part, of necessity must 
be, by the innocent in place of the guilty. 

But, at last, in that New World, where we of the Old 
World fancy hope has her dwelling— but in a part of it 
touched by the pathos of payment, on a very large scale, of 
certain wages of sin — it came about that Mary Crookenden, 
in obedience to a simple and, on the surface of it, very 
inadequate cause, began at last to overget her spirit of 
unrest. 

It happened thus. Lancelot — rather incited thereto 
by Lady Calmady, I believe — joined the travellers in New 
York. And while there the fancy took Miss Crookenden to 
journey down south and visit her mother’s home. An un- 
known uncle and aunt — bachelor and spinster — still live in 
a portion of the large, wide-verandahed mansion, with 
quaint mixture of straitened means and stately etiquette. 
And there, one day, waiting under the magnolias before 
the house, for Lancelot and one of the negro servants to 
bring round the horses for her early ride, Mary, moved by 
a sudden impulse, said to the Rector, as he stood by her 
holding her whip while she fastened her gloves : — 

4 Tell me, Uncle Kent, what does one end by doing when 


45o 


The Wages of Sin. 


all the best is taken away from one, when life has grown 
trivial, stunted, and narrow; when the sun of one’s happi- 
ness is set ? ’ 

And Kent Crookenden mused a little, letting his kindly 
eyes rest first on the great half-ruinous house, and then on 
the girl’s face, white as the opening magnolia blossoms 
above her head. 

1 After a time, Polly, not at once — that would be asking 
too much of poor human nature — but after a time, my dear, 
one lights a candle called Patience, and guides one’s foot- 
steps by that.’ 

1 Do you speak out of your own experience ? ’ Mary 
asked, gravely. 

‘ Yes,' he said. 

And then he rehearsed to her the story of a courtship 
which had gone forward, in this very Coudert Mansion, 
over thirty years ago. 

‘ To the best of my ability I lighted that candle the day 
your mother told me which of the two brothers who loved 
her she loved best. It burnt very badly at first, Polly, did 
my candle — guttered, had thieves in the wick ; and mean- 
while I stumbled pretty freely. But, by God’s grace, it 
has burnt brighter as time has gone by — burns brightly 
enough now, as I humbly trust, to light me down the long 
hill of old age without any very discreditable tumbles.’ 

* Ah, dear Uncle Kent,' Mary exclaimed, softly. 

The Rector felt for the black ribbon, and drew the little 
faded miniature out from its hiding-place. 

1 There is my romance,’ he said. 1 This is like her, but 
you are more like. And so you are very dear to me for 
sake's sake, as well as for your own. Try to light your 
candle of Patience, my Polly, in faith ; remembering that 
you are not alone. More than half the noblest men and 
women you meet carry such candles likewise. — Ah ! here 
come Lancelot and the horses. — Steady — are you all right ? 
Wait a moment, let me put your habit straight. Don’t go 
too far and tire yourself. — Take good care of her, Lance.’ 


THE END. 


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SUCCESSORS TO 

JOHN W. LOVELL COMPANY, 

142 TO 150 WORTH STREET. NEW YORK. 



To secure the most delicate and refined perfume from the roe 
it is necessary to discard the green central bulb. The above pictur 
reproduced from a photograph, shows a large number of girls ar 
women seated around tables piled high with roses, engaged in strippir 
off the leaves. 

Although this is a very tedious and expensive operation, y< 
Colgate & Co., each year, have millions of roses separately handle 
and stripped of their leaves, to obtain the most delicate odor for the 
unrivalled soaps and perfumes, the favorite of which is 

Cashmere Bouquei 


















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